Filing income-tax returns electronically is set to become easier, with the I-T Department planning to do away with the mandatory submission of verification in paper form.
At present, returns filed online without a ‘digital signature’ — a secure certificate that confirms the identity of the sender — require a verification form, ‘ITR V’, to be sent in physical form by post to the Department’s Central Processing Centre (CPC). The CPC, then, generates an electronic acknowledgement and sends it to the registered e-mail address in the returns. The Income-Tax Department says one in 10 assessees fails to send the ITR V to the CPC after e-filing.
The Income-Tax Department had made e-filing mandatory for those with an annual taxable income of Rs 5 lakh or more for the financial year 2012-13 and assessment year 2013-14, for which returns are to be filed by July 31. In 2012-13, over 2.14 crore assessees filed the returns electronically.
Doing away with the physical verification requirement will help in timely validation of e-returns, and taxpayers would avoid the hassles of postage, and tracking of the paper verification, an official said.
Further, since digital certificates require fees to be paid to the issuer and need to be renewed at intervals, the move would also save costs for tax payers, the official added.
“Another move being considered is third party validation of utilities developed for e-filing, which will help avoid mistakes in the returns and bring uniformity to interpretations of tax laws in filing of returns,” the official added.
E-filing of income-tax returns started in August 2006. Last year, the e-filing portal was revamped with new features such as extension of electronic filing of all income-tax return forms and enabling access to history of returns filed. According to information available on the Web site of the Income Tax Department, a total of 2.14 crore e-returns were filed in 2012-13, up 30.75 per cent over the 1.64 crore filed in 2011-12. This number includes both individual and corporate assessees.