The Income Tax Department has disclosed the number of total returns filed for the assessment year 2022-23, according to which about 1 crore people have not been able to file their returns this year. Now these taxpayers will have to go through all the difficulties including fines, late fees and interest for filing returns.
New Delhi. While waiting for the extension of the deadline for filing income tax returns, time passed and the Income Tax Department did not extend the date this time. If we compare the figures of last year, then this time around 1 crore taxpayers have missed filing their returns.
The Income Tax Department late on Monday night disclosed the number of total income tax returns filed for the financial year 2021-22 and told that till July 31, a total of 5.83 crore taxpayers have filed their returns. If we look at last year’s numbers, it was 6.8 crores. In such a situation, about 90.7 lakh taxpayers have missed filing returns this time. This number has come on comparison with last year’s figures, while the actual number will definitely be beyond one crore.
In fact, the Income Tax Department had estimated the number of return filers to reach 7 crore this year, which was just 32 lakh more than last year. In such a situation, this estimate was also believed to be accurate, but after the actual number came out, it is being speculated that now one crore taxpayers may have to pay fines and late fees for filing returns.
Returns can be filed till December 31, but…
Taxpayers who have missed filing returns by July 31, the Income Tax Department allows them to file their returns by December 31, but for this they will have to pay late fees and fines. As per income tax rules, taxpayers whose income is less than Rs 5 lakh will have to pay a late fee of Rs 1000, while those with income above Rs 5 lakh can file their return with a late fee of Rs 5,000.
Apart from this, the Income Tax Department can also impose a penalty ranging from 50 percent to 200 percent of his total outstanding tax. He will also be issued a notice by the department and interest will also be charged on a daily basis till the ITR is filed from the end of the return deadline. Not only this, the department will also have the right to prosecute the taxpayer and send him to jail in case of excess tax arrears.
Record ITR on the last day this year
Anticipating the extension of the deadline, when the taxpayers felt that this time the department would not change the last date, there was an influx of returnees on the last day and a total of 72.42 lakh returns were filed till the night of July 31. This is the record so far. This time around 50 percent of the total ITRs filed have filled the ITR-1 form, whose number stood at 2.93 crore. After this, 11.5 percent i.e. 67 lakh people have filled ITR-2 form, 10.9 percent i.e. 63.55 lakh people have filled ITR-3 form and 26 percent i.e. 1.54 crore people have filled ITR-4 form. Of the total ITRs, 47 per cent have been filed through online mode.
