Government on Monday indicated the one-by-six scheme for assessing income tax will be looked into to include wireless in local loop-based mobile phones.
"We will look into the whole gamut of 1X6 scheme," Finance Minister Jaswant Singh said replying to a query by a top executive of a leading telecom player on why WLL phones are not treated at par with other mobile phones.
Currently, subscribers of mobile phones come under the 1X6 scheme while government exempted fixed-line subscribers and WLL owners from the mandatory tax assessment.
"I would certainly like to have a mobile phone for which I won't come under the 1X6 scheme," Singh quipped at a Confederation on Indian Industry post-Budget meeting, indicating that WLL-based phones may also be treated like other mobile phone and be part of 1X6 scheme.
People having any of the six - house, car, credit cards, club memberships, mobile phones and foreign travel - come under the 1X6 scheme for assessment of income tax.
Bharti group chairman Sunil Mittal said the cellular industry has asked government to remove the anomaly in roping in mobile phone owners into the 1X6 scheme but exempting WLL services from it.
On the restoration of tax sops under Section 10A and 10B, the finance minister said "Information Technology has been encouraged in this budget."
If there is any aspect that needs to be addressed to boost the domestic IT industry, the government would certainly look into it, he said, adding "the government will stand by what it says."
On taxing IT export services, Singh said "there is no intention to tax exports."
© 2026