If the government is to be believed, the ban on high-value currency led to a significant surge in India's tax base over the past year. To back this claim, the government has released a deluge of data. Including the claim that that there was a 25 per cent increase in tax returns in the April-August 2017 period, compared to the same period last year. That is correct, but the surge is not unusual given what demonetisation was meant to achieve.