The Income-Tax Department has recently issued notification notices to 22,000 taxpayers, which include both salaried individuals and high-net-worth individuals as well as trusts. These notifications were sent because there were inconsistencies detected between the deductions declared in their Form 16 or Annual Information Statement (AIS) and the data available in the possession of the Income Tax Department.
It’s important to note that all of these notices were issued for the tax returns filed for the assessment year 2023-24, and they were dispatched within the last 15 days.
In particular, approximately 12,000 of these notices were directed toward salaried taxpayers who had discrepancies of over Rs 50,000 between the tax deductions they claimed in their returns and the data maintained by the Income Tax Department.
The Income Tax Department has also dispatched notices to roughly 8,000 taxpayers who have submitted returns as Hindu Undivided Families (HUFs). In these cases, there was a substantial income discrepancy of more than Rs 50 lakh when comparing the return filed and the data held by the department. Additionally, they sent out notifications to 900 high net worth individuals (HNIs) where the disparity was Rs 5 crore or more, and 1,200 trusts and partnership firms where the difference was over Rs 10 crore.
In summary, the primary data analysis has identified irregularities and discrepancies in the returns filed by around 2 lakh taxpayers. These discrepancies could involve inconsistencies in income declarations, expenditures, or bank account details when compared to the data collected by the department from transactions linked to their bank or UPI accounts.
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The initial notification notice is this one. An official from the income-tax department stated that a demand notice would only be processed if taxpayers ignore it or fail to offer any clarification.
The official said that in other cases, taxpayers had not included capital gains, or dividend income, and altogether excluded the information about their other bank accounts. The official stated that people may pay the due tax with an amended return and interest or offer a clear explanation about it.
In the case of corporations, trusts, partnership firms, and small enterprises, a more thorough sector-specific data analysis was being done, according to another official.
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Tracking any intended evasion is been facilitated via the digitization of the economy and moving effectively syncing of account aggregators shall make evasion much more hardened, as per the second official, who also mentioned that the work is already on track to make the Annual Information Statement (AIS) more complete and detailed.
A taxpayer’s complete perspective of information is provided via AIS.
