CBDT alert! Good news from Income Tax department for these ITR filers

It's a good piece of news for Income Tax return filers as they have now got time till 30 September to rectify incomplete tax returns of last five years. Taking a major decision, the Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT), Government of India, has provided one-time relaxation for verification of e-filed tax returns for Assessment Years 2015-16 to 2019-20, which are pending due to non-filing of the ITR-V form.

CBDT acknowledged that a large number of electronically filed ITRs still remain pending with the Income Tax Department for want of receipt of a valid ITR-V Form at CPC, Bengaluru from the taxpayers concerned.

With this big development, CBDT now permits verification of such returns either by sending a physical copy of the ITR-V to CPC, Bengaluru or through EVC/OTP modes, latest by 30th Sept 2020.

Recently, the Income Tax Department had facilitated a new functionality for Banks and Post offices through which they can ascertain the TDS applicability rates on cash withdrawal of above Rs.20 lakh in case of a non-filer of the income-tax return and that of above Rs. 1 Crore in case of a filer of the income-tax return. So far, more than 53,000 verification requests have been executed successfully on this facility.

CBDT had said that this functionality available as “Verification of applicability u/s 194N” on www.incometaxindiaefiling.gov.in since 1st July 2020,is also made available to the Banks through web-services so that the entire process can be automated and be linked to the Bank’s internal core banking solution.

CBDT said that now the Bank/Post Office has to only enter the PAN of the person who is withdrawing cash for ascertaining the applicable rate of TDS. On entering PAN, a message will be instantly displayed on the departmental utility: “TDS is deductible at the rate of 2% if cash withdrawal exceeds Rs. 1 crore” [if the person withdrawing cash is a filer of the income-tax return] and “TDS is deductible at the rate 2% if cash withdrawal exceeds Rs. 20 lakh and at the rate of 5% if it exceeds Rs. 1 Crore” [if the person withdrawing cash is a non-filer of the income-tax return].