New Delhi, Aug. 27 -- The affirmative principles of tax policy are settled doctrine. Equity, fairness, certainty, simplicity, neutrality, predictability, efficiency, transparency and adequacy. This is the modern tax-policy canon, descended from Adam Smith's four maxims and distilled by the OECD's Ottawa framework, it is accepted globally.

India's problem has rarely been ignorance of what should guide tax policy, but an unwillingness to name what should not. Here are five anti-canons that tend to write our tax laws today, and must be barred from writing them tomorrow.

One, revenue maximization must not be the basic motive: It is the result of good tax policy, never its premise. A statute drafted with collection targets as its architectur...