Need to extend Income Tax Return due date of July 31 to December 31

Advocate Akhilesh Kumar Sah

CBDT, vide its notification F.No. 275/38/2017-IT(B) Dated: 4th June, 2019, with a view to redress genuine hardship of deductors in timely filing of TDS statement in Form 24Q on account of revision of its format and consequent updating of the File Validation Utility for its online filing, in exercise of its powers under section 119 of the Income Tax Act, 1961 has extended the due date of filing of TDS statement in Form 24Q for financial year 2018-19 from 31st of May, 2019 to 30th of June, 2019 and also extended the due date for issue of TDS certificate in Form 16 for financial year 2018-19 from 15th of June, 2019 to 10th of July, 2019.

Due date of filing IT returns under section 139(1):

As per Explanation 2 of section 139(1) of the Income Tax Act, 1961, for the purposes of the sub-section (1) of section 139, “due date” means,—

(a) where the assessee [other than an assessee referred to in clause (aa)] is—

(i) a company; or

(ii) a person (other than a company) whose accounts are required to be audited under this Act or under any other law for the time being in force; or

(iii) a working partner of a firm whose accounts are required to be audited under this Act or under any other law for the time being in force, the 30th day of September of the assessment year;

(aa) in the case of an assessee who is required to furnish a report referred to in section 92E, the 30th day of November of the assessment year;

(b) in the case of a person other than a company, referred to in the first proviso to this sub-section, the 31st day of October of the assessment year;

(c) in the case of any other assessee, the 31st day of July of the assessment year.

After Section 234E of the Act, the following section has been inserted by the Finance Act, 2017, with effect from the 1st day of April, 2018[A.Y.2018-19):-

234F. (1) Without prejudice to the provisions of this Act, where a person required to furnish a return of income under Section 139, fails to do so within the time prescribed in sub-section (1) of said section, he shall pay, by way of fee, a sum of-

(a) Five thousand rupees, if the return is furnished on or before the 31st day of December of the assessment year;

(b) Ten thousand rupees, in any other case;

Provided that if the total income of the person does not exceed five lakh rupees, the fee payable under this section shall not exceed one thousand rupees.

(2) The provisions of this section shall apply in respect of return of income required to be furnished for the assessment year commencing on or after the 1st day of April, 2018.

For the help of assessees and tax professionals countrywide:

India is a large country with large number of taxpayers whose accounts are not liable to be audited i.e. person falling under the category of July 31st due date. Demands are generated by CPC where TDS mismatches. Also server problems occur of Income Tax India e-filing site. Some taxpayers / assessees also have to comply GST last dates. Taxpayers faced a lot of problem last year and even pensioners/ senior citizens paid late fees on late filing of returns. With a view to make tax system taxpayers friendly and cooperative, the due date of 31st July should be changed to 31st December, every year. The coming central budget(on 5 July 2019) may consider the above mentioned problems.