Exemptions, and the fact that farm income is outside the tax net, ensure that India´s tax GDP ratio stays low The view that Indians don´t pay their fair share of taxes resonates widely in public discourse.So much so that even Finance Minister Arun Jaitley presented figures in his recent Budget to buttress the claim of India being a tax non compliant society. But how accurate is this widely held view? Is tax compliance, especially on the personal income tax side, as poor as is being made out to be? The data points in both directions. Economists point to the Economic Survey (201516) which showed that the average tax GDP ratio for emerging economies is 21.4 per cent, while that for India is way lower at 16.6 per cent. The difference is largely on the direct tax side where India´s tax GDP ratio is at 5.6 per cent compared to the emerging market average of 7.4 per cent.On the indirect tax side, India´s tax GDP ratio of 10.1 per cent is only marginally lower than the emerging market average