The Income Tax refunds during the first half of current financial year have come down to Rs 46,000 crore from Rs 60,000 crore in the same period last year.
“The IT refund in April-September period of this fiscal stood at Rs 46,000 crore,” a finance ministry official said.
The government has set up Central Processing Centre (CPC) at Bangalore in 2010 to bring down time for refund and help the revenue department to cope with the rapid growth in the number of tax-payers.
In the current financial year as on August 2012, the number of refunds disbursed stood 33.51 lakh, out of which 3.15 lakh refunds were executed through bank facility.
In case of refund bank facility, refund directly goes to account of concern assessee.
The gross direct tax collection during first half of 2012-13 was Rs 2.72 lakh crore, up 5.87 per cent as against annual target of 15 per cent.
For the current fiscal, the government has set a direct tax collection target of Rs 5.7 lakh crore, which is about 15.2 per cent more than the actual collection of Rs 4.95 lakh crore in the previous fiscal
One reason could be that there was a higher than normal refund made last FY, and so the ‘arrears’ of refund has come downthis FY. This of course assumes that there has been no deliberate slowdown by th I-T Dept. in regard to processing of refunds in FY 2012-13.
Let us hope that our present FM’s instructions to the Dept. to expedite refunds, is implemented.
Having set up the CPC to bring down the time for refund, the taxpayers’ / refundees’ normal expectation was that the time taken for settling the refund claims would be markedly reduced, and brought down to a commendable level.That it has not turned out to be so, is borne out by the very comparison of the figures of year/period wise refunds actually processed and reached.
According to information gathered, for instance, expectant-refundees for the assessment year 2011-12,who have filed the returns / claims, electronically or otherwise,in Bangalore, as long back as in July 2011, are still looking forward to the refunds finding the way.
As may be recalled,not long ago, the department was reported to have been resorting to the gimmics of delaying refunds,unfairly so, but simply in order to meet its own inhouse targets set for gross/ net revenue for the fiscal. If so, by any logic, it is detestable; for, the department cannot be regarded to have acted truly and fairly, despite its repeated open assurances to the dutiful taxayers to henceforth be favourably disposed, at least in settling the refund claims expediously.
The CBDT is obliged to set things right; the earliest,the best.