Washington: The outflow of black money from India to foreign countries has increased nine-fold from USD 10 billion in 2003 to USD 94.7 billion in 2012. India has replaced Malaysia as the fourth largest exporter of black money after China, Russia and Mexico for the 10-year period from 2003-2012.
Such has been the upward trajectory of outflow of Indian black money to foreign countries that in 2012, India replaced Mexico as the third largest exporter of illicit money for that year.
According to the latest report ‘Illicit Financial Flows from Developing countries' released by Washington-based research and advocacy group, Global Financial Integrity (GFI), in 2003, India sent just USD 10.17 billion of black money overseas, which increased to USD 19.41 billion in 2004, and to over USD 20 billion in 2005.
In 2006 there was substantial increase in outflow of Indian black money to foreign countries—USD 28 billion, which increased to USD 34.6 billion in 2007 and USD 47.1 billion in 2008.
There was a sudden dip in outflow of black money in 2009 when GFI says it came down to USD 29 billion. But then the next year in 2010, the outflow of black money from India more than doubled to USD 70 billion and then increased to USD 86 billion in 2011, GFI says.
In fact, the amount of black money going out to foreign countries is now larger than the amount of hard-earned money being remitted to the country by expatriate Indians. According to the latest World Bank report, in 2014, India is expected to receive USD 71 billion in remittances. This is quite a turn-around since 2003 when remittances were USD 16.39 billion as against black money outflow of USD 10.177 billion.
According to GFI, the top five exporters of illicit capital over the past ten years on average are: China, Russia, Mexico, India and Malaysia.
The issue of black money has been matter of a serious political debate in India, including during the last general elections. While the new government has said it is committed to tackle this menace, there are no official figures for the overall size of illicit wealth stashed by Indians within the country or abroad.
