Dated: 23rd September 2017
Dear Sir
Greetings for the day. Hope you are in Good Health.
For the first time in my life I have seen a Prime Minister who works 24*7 to address the problems being faced by the people of this country. I have great regard & respect for the dedication & commitment that your as Pradhan Sevak have shown in making our country walk the path of progress & development. Your untiring efforts have made this country overcome the challenges that it has been facing. Looking at your positive approach towards addressing common man’s concerns I am encouraged to write this letter to you. In this letter I wish to draw your attention to the problems the common man is facing in filing the Income Tax Returns off late. The issues that I have highlighted are the issues of taxpayers through the eyes of a practicing Chartered Accountant.
Sir, the people of this country are law abiding. They wish to comply with the provisions of law but not at the cost of mental peace. The technological innovations that the Income Tax department has achieved are noteworthy & I deeply appreciate it. This will go a long way in reducing corruption & ensuring transparency. However the pace with which the innovations & the up gradations are being implemented are not in pace with which the people of this country work. Today (22nd September 2017) the Income Tax department has asked for details of email id, mobile no & bank account from the taxpayers. The said data is to be updated on the efiling website of the Income Tax department failing which the taxpayer cannot gain access to the site. The department insists that a single email id & mobile no should be linked to three user id only. Sir, this is a rather harsh & cumbersome way of updating of the Income Tax dept database. In our society there are many people who still leave in joint families. A single person in family looks after all the law related issues. Being a practicing chartered accountant I am testimony to this fact. Thus this limit of three is very less. Also, Please try to understand that the people of this country though literate in educational terms are not technologically literate. There are people who still have no idea as to how to open an email account or how to check a message received on a mobile phone (especially the older generation). For these people to file their IT return becomes a challenging job. In my office I have clients who still do not have an email. I have to assist them to open an email account. Even in case where the email accounts are opened I have observed that the taxpayer forgets the password of the email account or the email id itself. India being a large country where we have 40 million taxpayers (approx) such cases are bound to be very high. The professional fraternity like CA’s can assist these taxpayers but only to a limited extent. It becomes very difficult to serve the taxpayers on a daily basis as far as these procedural issues are concerned. Also the taxpayers are of the impression that this is a futile exercise & they don’t want to understand the importance of the same. The taxpayers of this country have not woken up to the fact that the government department can have correspondence with them through email & mobile message. As such this defeats the purpose which the Income Tax department wants to achieve by undertaking this exercise. Sir we appreciate that this initiative of Income Tax department is progressive but first the department need to educate the taxpayer of its importance. If the department fails to do it then it shall be solely responsible in failing to achieve its objective of making the department more transparent & taxpayer friendly.
Secondly, the timing of this exercise by the IT department is not correct. The entire country is in a GST transition phase. Your Goodself must be aware that taxpayers are facing a lot of problems to file their GST returns due to inherent technical glitches in the system. Many of my clients are still not able to furnish the GST returns in time. Add to this now is also the time to file Tax Audit reports & the IT returns in case of assesses who are to get their books of account audited. The taxpayers who are mostly businessman are also busy in their day to day activity due to the onset of the festive season. As such, the chance of taxpayers responding to the call of the Income Tax department in this festive season is very low.
Thus we request you to ask the Income tax Department to postpone this activity as of now. Allow the taxpayers to adapt to GST environment & let them file their tax audits & IT returns in time. This procedural exercise can be done later. If not then at least don’t make it compulsory. There are still many taxpayers in this country who are yet to link their Aadhar number to PAN & bank
accounts.
Hope you take this letter in a positive spirit & direct the authorities to take appropriate action.
Yours faithfully
CA.Kaustubh Vijay Paturkar
The Prime Minister
7, Lok Kalyan Marg,
New Delhi.
Relevant Posts :-
आपण मांडलेली समस्या अत्यंत बोलकी व वास्तव आहे भारत हा खेड्यापाड्यांनी बनलेला देश आहे अती दुर्गम व डोंगराळ प्रदेशानी युक्त आहे .कित्येक लोकाना आजुनही इंटरनेटचा वापर कसा करावा हे माहीत नाही त्याही पेक्षा सर्वाना रेंज मिळतेच असेही नाही आनि मिळाली तर इमेलचा वापर करता येत नसल्याने हे करदाते काहीच करु शकत नाही आजुनही Tax awareness नाही यासाठी देशात तंत्रज्ञान व त्याचा प्रत्यक्ष वापर करन्याची कुवत निर्मान व्हायला हवी सर्व सक्ती करुन साध्य होणार नाही त्यासाठी करदात्यामध्ये इच्छाशक्ती हवी .
true, a very harsh and very bad decision at very bad time
Nice and appreciable one. IT Dept think that every assessee is having a separate email ID and Mobile no and they are seeing and responding the communication from ITD. But in real practice, even-though educated assessees having their own mobile no and Email ID registered with ITD, not having intellectual approach to the communication from ITD. In this situation what about un-educated assessees and others situation. Being a tax practitioner, how much email IDs can be verifiable by a practitioner within a particular time. What an un imaginable approach of activity by the ITD in this regard of 3 of 3 Mobile & email ID. Being pushes from GST, already practitioners in high mental pressure, now from ITD also a new pressure. How much data can be collected from a client and entered in different different websites for a client in a short time. Are the practitioners seen like a data entry operator from the point of view of Govt. ITD should give some peace of time in this regard else they may start this activities in a leisure time alt east, after the 44 AB due dates finished and there after. Because tax practice is a mental torture work now a days. Please save this service sector from work and mental pressure.
BELIEVE OR NOT, THE ENTIRE BUSINESS IS ANNOYED WITH HUGE BURDEN, BOTH FINANCIALLY AND MENTALLY , THRUST ON THEM, THEY HAVE FORGOTTEN TO DO BUSINESS, WHICH IN PRESENT TIME IS ALREADY VERY CHALLENGING, THEY ARE STRUGGLING HARD FOR THEIR EXISTENCE…..ALL THESE MEASURES ARE PAVING THE WAY FOR RAHUL TO BECOME THE NEXT PM…..
ekdam sahi likha hai.jo jankari mangi ja rahi vah Ay18-19 ka return jama karte samay bhi ek alag form me li ja sakati hai.roj roj naye aadesh se log pareshani mahasus kar rahe hai.yah bhi kiya ja skata hai ki nirdharia form me jankari incometax ooffice me jama karne ki vavastha ki jaye kyoki har vakti online kam karne me perfect nahi hota hai.
This is nothing but harassing the people.
There are deaf, dumb, blind singles, some in Old age homes, who cannot hear, see, understand the mails/messages, who do not have access to internet, mobile, still required to pay income tax and seek others’ help.
Very good representation sir. Hope the PMO will take suitable action and give relief.
Thank you Mr CA.Kaustubh Vijay Paturkar for writting a open letter to OUR HONORABLE PRIME MINISTER
I hope the message reaches the right people. Yesterday I tried it doing for myself. Being a CA also i found it difficult. My two mobile nos and two email ids were not available for me. I had to opt for 3 rd phone and a new email id. There were many people for whom i filed returns using my mail id and phone no as they were not tech savvy but poor people who wanted to claim refund from I T Dept. They never came back to me but my mobile no and email id are stuck in their profile. This is high level of absurdity, i have come across. somebody is messing up the smooth working of I T website and making it illogical even for a CA to understand.
Thanks to CA Mr.Kaushtubh V Paturkar for wrote open letter to our PM regarding limited the e-mail n contact nos.in the rural areas where network’s not available also numbers of assessed are not well aware regarding e-mail even TOP So how it can be possible ?
This is just a protest against the best idea to bring transparency in the system a big jolt , keep India into mediaeval ages in terms of transparency and a ploy to keep the clutch on clients. People are giving voluntarily their every detail for online purchases and discounts.
It’s time to be matured so that people can have more faith on the system and on the books as well as everyone including the client should also have his details with him.
Salute to Prime Minister for GST and other these type of measures which would help in bringing transparency and maturity in Indian Accounting and Taxation system and also provide us a step forward for international comparability , otherwise we would keep on arguing who should get credit of what, doing nothing and keep our ‘Moun’ on everything.
CA Kaustubh has highlighted the issue. Action of the department to block access to the Department website till the profile is updated is high handed efiling is not voluntary. If it was so then such conditions can be imposed. They should have given time of at least 4 months to update the profile. This approach of the bureaucracy is giving a bad name to the Government.
This is the additional burdon on CA and Income tax Practioners . As tax payers and practioners facing too many techinical problems . Relief should be given to update the data and expected more space for update the E mail and Mobile no should be given .
Reply
I agree with you Mr. Kausthub. One more point to be noted is that after updating the additional information on I T Website a new hurdle to obtain tow OTP from client simultaneously for validation. We as practicing person cannot complete the task without getting these two OTPs from client when the client may not be in a position to have access to his Email. Then all the efforts of updating the info goes waste.
Updating profile process for all user is unfair.why IT wants bank account number. Every time taxpayer giving account number in the return. Whose mobile is in use why they want to know. There is no provision for mother using son’s mobile hence show relative. Postponed the updating profile.It is a HARRESMENT.
It is the most appropriate and right time you have raised the concern to the Prime Minister. Though Our Honorable PM wants to do so many things for the people of India, the Govt machinery does not work in the right spirit to help the Tax Payers. The IT Department is in a very defunct-ed state and know only to send notices, but not to see the responses/Replies sent by the Tax-Payers. Visit any IT Office even at the peak hours of Rush, you find the officials loitering, chewing pan and not attending the Problems of Tax Payers. Officials in IT Dept totally defeat the cause of progress set by PM to achieve. These IT Dept Officials shall be made accountable. and the Phone calls need to be monitored for the QUALITY OF the Conversation.
Honorable Prime Minister also needs to Direct the other concerned Depts. who issue the Documents like Aadhar, Pass-Port, Pan card, Ration Card, etc to set right the few things as follow.
1.STANDARDIZE the Name Pattern:The column for names of people shall be standardized in all document Aadhaar, PassPort, PAN Card, all bank accounts, Driving licences etc. so that in all document only one type of name appears for the Person and no miss-match can occur due to name discrepancy.
2. Standardize the DOB Pattern: DD/MM/YYYY for all Documents.
3. The above two, Standardised Name, & DOB , shall be taken along with Mobile No. for linking all documents of any Individual.
Very rightly representated. Promised Ease of life heading towards stress full life
Thank you Mr CA.Kaustubh Vijay Paturkar for writting a open letter to OUR HONORABLE PRADANA SEVAK Regarding in this Critical time,
I hope that OUR HONORABLE Narendra Modiji will take the step for these issues
Thank you Mr. CA KV Paturkar for highlighting the issue, We understand the logic and cause of such steps initiated by honourable PM. But we have also to understand its timing factor.
At this time the above steps taken by the department create unnecessary difficulties to the law abiding people.
Our aim is to make to Society follow the rules and laws. Self regulation is the best way. If we keep them simple then people with abide it and respect it. Controlling by introducing check points create the new way to avoid it.
I respect the steps taken by the department and I request them to differ it to the time when our people understand the cause of it and support it by heart to achieve it goals
this letter not required
vikas gando thayo che.vikas pagal ho chuka hai
I have observed in the letter that 40 millions of tax payers, as you know how many people from service sector are paying (soft ware employees), they are well versed with the net and emails and phones. in manufacturing only highly paid employees are paying tax as per the law, they also know the the net and emails, and phones.
then were is the requirement of this letter, why some people are giving own emails and phone nos rather than real persons no and email. i think this letter is not required.
I am being a tax consultant, I am facing so many problems to create email and opt a mobile number for the clients. As they are not in a position to understand the issues, they want for early redress their problems So I request the Government to revise the procedures (or) post pone for some period, as the people are to be understanding the procedures of GST and to file tax audit case, in this scenario it is not correct to implement this type of profile update under income tax efiling portal
PLEASE PM MODI JI …..REALLY WE ARE FACING SUCH PROBLEM AT THE TIME OF TAX AUDIT….ITS GOOD TO UPGRADE OUR SOCIETY FIRST….
I AGREE WITH Mr CA.Kaustubh Vijay Paturkar…..
If email address is provided, Mob number should not be insisted upon
I filed my income tax return on 13th June 2017 and I am filing nearly for the past 50 years, Presently my main source of income is from central govt pension. So far there was no problem. But strangely and foolishly from the IT Dept, I received a notice from them for addition of income under section 143(1)a for the income exempt under 80c (1.5 lach ppf) and 80TTA (10000) and 16000 which was reported dividends from equity oriented mutual funds which is also exempted from IT.I have replied for this through a CA on 2nd Aug 17 and awaiting for their reply. This is very unfair for a honest tax payer like me.
Suggest open gmail Accounts for each assessee and put Forwarders to their CA or family member handling the work, while taking care to also tick the box to leave the incoming email on the server.
The same situation can’t be used to forward SMSes/Text messages.
It seems the problem is to the chartered accountants who want to keep their clients uninformed. Otherwise why not give the clients Mobile and E mail id. so that they are able to know progress of their cases and accordingly interact with their C.As.
I know a case where for such reasons a friend of mine was unaware of tax of Rs.20000 levied in 2004-05 till his claim for refund in 2016-17 was held up and he started investigating the reasons.
The tax payers have already registered their particulars with CPC giving the details of Aadhar, Bank account, email ID. Repeatedly the information is being asked multiple times.
Every year, the bank account particulars are being furnished in the return of income, still the refunds are not being credited. Reminders are sent by CPC that the refunds are not credited to the bank a/cs.
Why the master information of the tax payer synced with PAN on permanency basis, need to be furnished every year wasting valuable time of the assessees, tax payers, tax professionals.
With floods in Mumbai, rain disruptions in Bangalore, the digital cities are without power, internet, without mobile signals, without landline corrections up and working.
The time to file the IT returns is one part and to support the tax assessee with regard to registrations, AAdhar linking, refund verification, registering of bank a/c particulars, e verification, SMS that ITRV not received even after sending, DSC procurement and renewals, add so much of unproductive work and avoidable waste of time.
Same time can be deployed in much better productive work like cleaning up Country by participating in Swacha Bharat,
Further, all these works need to be done during peak season of audits and filing works, leaving all the festive and pooja season like Durga, Ganesha, Diwali, Dusserah seasons.
Pathetic, Irrational, Illogical and hope better wisdom prevail.
Nice job sir. Its a harassment to cliants as well as to consultant.
It is a an accepted fact that when Government is trying to eliminate Tax evasions, there will be some co-lateral damages to common people. All practicing chartered Accountants know how Taxes are evaded/avoided. Therefore, instead of opposing the Government move, they should suggest changes so that Government objectives are achieved with minimum disruption to common people repeat common people. I have following comment to offer.
1) Timing of the changes: Common man will not have, under normal circumstances, to deal with the Income Tax site if the Return has already been filed. Thus he has time till next June/July to upgrade details. Common man is no way connected to GST filings. Bank details are already required to be submitted in the Tax return and thus it will now be one time affair of providing bank details.
2) For practicing Chartered accounts, Government can relax the rule provided the practicing chartered accountants separately register themselves with full details of their CA Registration number and Aadhar card number.
3) Regarding “Technical Literacy ” of common people, it will not be unusual expectation from people with more than Rs 5 lakhs Taxable income or senior citizen of more than 80 years old to learn the technical aspect of mobile phone and email. It is their clear lethargy not to learn new things or deliberate attempt to remain out of tax net.
4) Mobile number has now become an identity and thus with national porting facility available, there is no need to change the mobile number. Also currently dual sim mobiles are available very cheap and thus it is not difficult to maintain two sim cards at nominal extra cost when the business demands.
We can not hope to Prime Minister. B
urocracy is above the leadership. Leadership comes at the time of election other wise leader becomes burocrate after election
formerly the efiling portal was user friendly and easy to log in . But now income tax department is making it a pain in the neck. Income tax dept should reverse to the old system. the dept does not get any extra information by insisting on the elaborate data inclusion,.
Technological usage in the IT filing is welcome step, if it makes life simple rather making it complex….IT is not using the IT to simplify the process of efiling……ultimately there will be loss of revenue…the people who are filing now….they are facing problems….which needs to be addressed first….
The dept. could not control itself from deriving sadistic pleasures. simply speaking – instead 0f all the above conditions, it can send a code to e mail / cell no whenever 1 is logging in. The same can be given in the site. If the assessee ever wants to know who are all the people logged in (say upto 3 / 5 /10 details of those who lgged in previously ) .
This is nothing BUT troubling the assessees – like they troubled when the asseesees visited their offices.
This is the additional burdon on CA and Income tax Practioners . As tax payers and practioners facing too many techinical problems . Relief should be given to update the data and expected more space for update the E mail and Mobile no should be given .
Nice initiative Kaustabh ji.
He is working 24×7 to create problems.
Mobile no belongs to : self / Brother / sister / parent / spouse / friend ……. ……… What is all this nonsense ? Tax payers are criminals ? Government doesn’t have so much data of even criminals. Courtesy & polite requests are meeting only deaf ears.
I have 50% of the clients who do not have E-mail. 75% of the clients without Computer, Again about 75% of the clients without internet. 25% do not have mobile, 60% do not have smart phones.
In such situation how can you expect them to interact with ITD portal online.
The action of the TDS of 22nd Sept 2017 is very bad. We have to now search for people with Mobile and E-mail id who have not used it for ITD purpose.
Income tax work has become more dangerous than blue whale game created by hon,bless criminal lawyer our FM and him,bless pm
I am being a tax consultant i had given my email id
mobile no to other 9 accounts of my clients for e filing registration.But when i tried to open my account in the IT portal it has rejected my mobile No and email ID as it is exceeding the 3 no limit.So I have to choose a new mobile no and new ID to access my account.This kind of practical difficulty should be avoided by choosing a better method.
Our PM follows the three monkey rules of Mahatma Gandhiji – do not see the problems of small time assessee, do not hear the problems of small time assessee, and do not talk about the problems of small time assessee. He follows this principles in GST matters also. He didn’t follow this principles before electing PM of this country. Anyway, we should dance as per whims of our elected representatives and their (not ours) officers.
Sir
Even I had written a similar letter to the web manager of e-filing website which is copied below
Sir,
The Income tax website has initiated profile updation of registered assessees from today. In this aspect, I would like to bring up before certain points for your consideration.
1) Mobile number updation: Mobile number is being asked again for each registered PAN. If the same mobile is already registered with 10 pans, the system is asking for different mobile number. This would make the assessee to give his secondary mobile number for the time being and the same may be discarded in future. So any messages or communication sent to such secondary mobile will not be read by the assessee if he discards such secondary mobile number in future. This way, the main purpose of the IT Dept of communicating with the assessee itself will be hit. So, it is requested that the primary mobile number of the assessee should be accepted at the time of profile updation even if the same is associated for other PANs and such other associations should be cancelled.
2) Primary Email ids: Many of the assessees do not have valid email ids and most of the time, the email ids of the consultants are given for proper management of the communication from the dept. Most of the assessees even though having valid and active email ids, do not open their emails for days together and as such any communication from IT dept would be lost or delayed. If the primary email id given is that of the CA/consultant, there is every chance that any communication from Dept is read on daily basis and proper response could be given by the CA/consultant in consultation with the assessee. It is therefore requested that the email ids given by the assessee or his consultant should be accepted without any limit so that prompt response for communication from dept is given.
Also, the dept could make it a habit of mentioning either the PAN of the assessee or name of assessee in the emails while sending the communication for better management and response.
These are certain suggestions out of practical experience faced by us tax professionals and it is humbly requested that the required changes are introduced in profile update process of the registered taxpayers considering the practical approach.
Regards,
Vijay Paikoti
Rightly highlighted the issues. Putting undue compliance in name of better transparency is nothing but game of Service provider to increase their service charges. I will Exposing a Big CPC scam in coming days which will show you how our tax money is dwindled in name of better technology…
Thank u for taking up the issue in right earnestness.
Hope the Prime minister and the concerned will gear up to solve the problems faced by the assessee , CA’s, tax consultants. It is really difficult to comply I cannot go to my file in the IT portal due to the restrictions of 3 cases. At lease dept. should furnish the cases where we have given the same e mail and Mobile no. with reference to Pan no. and assessee name so that we can contact and get the same rectified at the time filing return not at this crucial time of tax audit, GST etc.,
Suggest that the Chartered Accountants and Advocates honour the rules and regulations of the land scrupulously and guide their clients to be law abiding.
Then they would have done a great service to the 24X7 hard working Pradhan Sevak.
Very appropriate suggestion, Thanks very much for taking forward the problem of tax payers, and rather problem of small time tax CAs like me, to adhere to this requirement, that too at this busy tax filing period.
Hope, some sense will prevail & postpone the date and also restore the TEN limits. Regards to CA Sri Kaustub.
Thank you Mr CA.Kaustubh Vijay Paturkar for writting a open letter to OUR HONORABLE PRADANA SEVAK Regarding in this Critical time,
I hope that OUR HONORABLE Narendra Modiji will take the step for these issues
NOTE:- Can Our Expert committee will take the step for these problems??
Thank you
ONE NATION ONE TAX
JAI HO DIRECT TAX (ONE TAX)
JAI HO INDIRECT TAX(ONE TAX)