Press Information Bureau
Government of India
Ministry of Finance
12-May-2015 17:32 IST
Income Tax Related Public Grievances
The Citizen’s Charter 2014 of Income Tax Department includes ‘Redressal of grievances’ within the specified timeline of 60 days, as one of the key taxpayer services provided by the Department. Redressal of grievances has been included as a key result area in the Interim Action Plan for the First Quarter of 2015-16 issued in March 2015. Instructions have been issued by the Central Board of Direct Taxes on 26th March, 2015 to all the Principal Chief Commissioners and Principal Director Generals of Income Tax to include redressal of public grievances as work of utmost priority in their work plan and to instruct all offices under their jurisdiction to dispose of the grievances pending with them, as per the Action Plan for the First Quarter of the FY 2015-16. This has been followed up with Video Conferencing of Chairperson, Central Board of Direct Taxes with Principal Chief Commissioners and Principal Director Generals of Income Tax on 9.4.2015.
Most of the grievances received from public with regard to Income Tax matters pertain to delay in issue of refunds and non-credit of taxes paid. The delay is mainly due to wrong quoting of details by the taxpayers in the Returns/Challans, mismatch of TDS reported in returns and the TDS credit available on the System, non-submission of requisite information/documents to fill the gap by the assessee/deductor, change of PAN jurisdiction, records of old assessment years being not easily available with jurisdiction Assessing Officer etc.
This was stated by Shri Jayant Sinha, Minister of State in Ministry of Finance in written reply to a question in the Rajya Sabha today.
I WELCOME THE GOVERNMENT / INCOME TAX DEPARTMENTS MOVE.
I WISH EVERY ONE AND ALL FOR THE BEST . MAY HATS OFF
TO GOVERNMENT AND INCOME TAX DEPARTMENT EMPLOYEES EVERY ONE AND ALL.
MY NAMASKARS. MY REQUEST IS PLEASE HELP ALL .
Such orders given from time to time are only eye wash. In practice, they are not followed. I have a case of correction in my assessment order for ay 2009-10 (fy 2008-09) and refund of tax overcharged. I have since repeatedly represented to CPC, Bangalore, my ITO Ward 36(4), Jt Director Range 36 and above all to Income Tax Ombudsman, Delhi but all that is happening is transferring my case from one office to the other for action but its finalisation seems no where in sight. I have again referred it to Income Tax Ombudsman for finalisation.
My experiance with Income Tax Ombudsman, Delhi, to whom I represented this case in the past too, is that he neither acknowledges receipt of grievance nor ever informs about action taken. He only forwards it to Income Tax Authority concerned for action. This I came to know when I filed an RTI application in his office and demanded copies of any communications issued by him in this matter.
Income Tax Officers are not passing the Rectification Orders and the Rectification applications are kept aside for years in spite of clear time limit for either accepting or rejecting the application.Tax Payers are harassed and they are pressurized to pay the demand by Tax Recovery officers and CPC also goes on adjusting the refunds against the demands uploaded by the ITO.The Gov. must come out with a penalty for the Officers for holding the Rectification applications.
Income tax department including CPC are not processing high value refunds. Standard answer given is “it is under process”. No action has been taken on RTI applications. If returns have been e-filed, jurisdiction officers are passing the responsibility to CPC.AOs are not giving effects to appeal orders resulting in refunds. It seems Modi government is aware of it but not interested. His government seems to be more interested in China than common man of India.