The United Progressive Alliance government will continue tax reforms, Finance Minister P Chidambaram said on Wednesday.

He said that tax rates will be reduced to Asean (Association of South East Asian Nations) levels in the coming years, administration will be improved and enforcement to check evasion will be stricter.

He also announced a slew of measures including help centres for small tax payers and e-payment facilities for 5,500 large companies to improve tax administration and push up revenue collections.

Chidambaram indicated that government intended to rely more on information and intelligence in the days to come rather than on search and seizures to check tax evasion and avoidance.

"Tax reform is an ongoing process... In course of time, it is our endeavour to bring down tax rates to the Asean level," he said after launching e-payment of excise and service tax in New Delhi.

Asserting that UPA has kept its promise of carrying out reforms in both direct and indirect taxes, he said India will soon have tax rates that are the best in the world.

Chidambaram, however, took a dig at those who were still evading taxes saying tax evasion and avoidance have emerged as an 'interesting business'. "If non-tax payers pay taxes, tax rates could be further moderated," he said.

"Tax rates must be moderate, tax administration should be user-friendly and enforcement impartial and strict," he said, adding non-tax payers will be eager to pay taxes if the administration is impartial and user-friendly.

While hinting at impartial and stricter enforcement of taxes, Chidambaram said: "I don't believe in heavy handedness. In certain cases we have to resort to search and seizures. But it is a thing of past and will be replaced by information gathering and intelligent use of that information."

Reeling out statistics, he said only 80,000-85,000 individuals show income of Rs 10,00,000 and above. "I am sure the number is much higher than that. Therefore, we must find those who are not paying taxes," he said.

He said the Annual Information Reporting, Bank Cash Transaction Tax and Tax Information Network will enable the tax departments to gather information, use them intelligently and track down tax evaders.

AIR envisages that high value transactions would be reported by the RBI, banks, SEBI, property registers and other authorities to the tax authorities.

TIN would collate this information and the tax paid by the taxpayers to find whether there is a case for tax evasion.

In case of BCTT, Chidambaram said it will put a tax trail on rather unusual transaction which serves no ostensible purpose.

All these methods would enable government to improve tax collections, he said.

He stressed on improvement in tax administration and appreciated the payment of taxes through the Internet.