Without getting into the merits or demerits of the directive, if the Zero Tax Option is removed, a whopping 1,474 companies—large and little, known and unknown—will be brought within the tax net. The roster of companies is as impressive as it is large: the country's largest steel company, the Steel Authority of India (SAIL), the largest bank, the State Bank of India (SBI), the largest private sector company, Reliance Industries, the largest sponge iron company, Essar Steel, the largest zinc-making company, Hindustan Zinc—the list is long. (Reliance has not been included in this exercise because although it did not pay income tax and is, therefore, a zero-tax company, it paid wealth tax.) Together, these companies generated business worth Rs 1,23,167.49 crore and a net profit of Rs 9,745.36 crore.