Faced with a severe manpower crunch, the income-tax department is seeking to outsource data entry work to private companies. It is also planning to outsource its future Group D staff (such as peons) requirements.

"By outsourcing the work, the department will be able to dispense with 2,500-3,000 new posts at this level," a finance ministry official said.

The Central Board of Direct Taxes has projected an additional requirement of around 15,000. Of this, nearly 6,000-7,000 additional staff will be required for data processing work related to annual information returns (AIRs).

"The income-tax department has collected a mine of information through AIRs. This has to be verified, compared with the tax returns of the individuals after identifying their permanent account number, and then processed further in case there is a mismatch between the investment undertaken and the income shown," the official said.

In addition to new staff to verify and process AIRs, additional manpower is also required by the department in the position of tax assistants and inspectors.

The recruitment of this additional staff would be on the lines of banking recruitment in order to have people on rolls by June next year.