Association of Chartered Accountants is voicing out against the confluent changes in the tax return filing software and forms seeking excess information about long-term capital gains tax.
In this regard the Bombay Chartered Accountant Society (BCAS) – India’s oldest voluntary body of Chartered Accountants, has written a letter to the finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman, seeking convenience in filing ITR. The letter calls attention to the chronology of form and changes introduced to the utility.
The letter of BCAS to FM asserts, “Constant tinkering with the forms necessitates changes in software on the e-filing portal; this in turn leads to delays in making the government utility available to taxpayers…The pain that is now being faced is beyond tolerance levels…,”
CA associations of Surat, Ahmedabad, Lucknow and Karnataka are also foreseeing to join the appeal made by BCAS regarding frequent updated in software which takes place during the intermediate period of ITR preparation.
Issues written by BCAS is about additional details of ISIN and Delayed introduction of Form 16s for employees.
ISIN (International Securities Identification Number) is a 12-digit alphanumeric number which is allotted to every security. This number is asked when the tax-payers furnish long-term capital gains.
BCAS wrote that these additions to the utility which asks additional information about ISIN will complicate the situations as ITR forms are already notified. To this, a clarification was issued from the Central Board of Direct Taxes within a few hours which states that the tax-payers who have already filed ITR-1, before the changes in utility, will not have to file it again.
So, 1.38 crore taxpayers who had filed their returns will not be required to consider the changes made to the utility.
Further, the issue regarding the lag in Form 16s for salaried professional was also called attention as chartered accountants had already filed returns for salaried class by June.
Raju Shah, former chairman of legal representation committee of CA Association of Ahmedabad said, “We couldn’t file returns in May-June as forms were notified late and salaried individuals didn’t receive their Form 16. In July, when we move over to business taxpayers, we are still getting salaried individuals returns,”.
To which CBDT made clarification saying, “Even though the utility is being updated regularly to provide ease to taxpayers, returns filed by using the previous version of the utility will continue to be valid. This means, those who have already filed the returns, will not need to re-file it as per the updated version of the software”.
Although the changes are made to bring ease for taxpayers, to combat tax evasion and to increase tax collection, the IT Dept. needs to bring in these mutations in their entire advertisements.
Chartered accountants study the changes and fare forward with them but taxpayers remain unaware about the same. It gives rise to a heavy-handed situation for the taxpayers as CA frequently visit them seeking additional information.
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Taxpayers have a sole motto of filing the ITRs on time and not getting penalized with Rs 5,000, for delayed filing. So if the taxpayers will be on board with the latest notifications and changes, C.A. will find it easy to incorporate the alterations.
