Deadline expires today
The National Board of Revenue has decided not to extend the deadline for submission of income tax returns for the current fiscal year by individual taxpayers though it has got depressing response and has received around 8 lakh returns with one day left for the end of deadline today, officials said. Though the NBR extended the deadline thrice till December 31, response from the taxpayers was very frustrating as the number of returns submitted this year was significantly lower than that of previous years, they said.
In last two-three years, more or less 10 lakh taxpayers filed income tax returns and paid taxes, they said.
On the other hand, the NBR extended the closing date for registration of
online taxpayer identification number (e-TIN) by three more months until March 31 as the NBR is
yet to get the desired response from the existing taxpayers.
The deadline for registration and re-registration for 12-digit e-TIN instead of 10-digit exiting TIN is supposed to end today and till Monday a total of 9.50 lakh taxpayers received e-TINs.
‘The deadline for submission of income tax returns will expire today and there is no way to extend it further due to legal constraint, a member of the revenue board told New Age on Monday.
According to Income Tax Ordinance-1984, deputy commissioner of taxes has the power to give three months to the taxpayer based on their application for submitting returns and the joint commissioner of taxes also has the same power, he said.
The revenue board cannot extend it further as only six months would remain after December, he added.
Officials said that the taxpayers who missed the time limit would be able to seek time from the DCT and JCT explaining reasons and DCT, and JCT each can give three months to the taxpayers for filing tax returns.
Taxpayers who will submit income tax returns today will have to face difficulty in paying taxes as December 31 is bank holiday.
Officials said that taxpayers would be able to pay tax by cheque to avoid the problem.
According to NBR statistics, around 1.77 lakh new taxpayers took e-TINs while 7.73 lakh taxpayers replaced their existing TIN with e-TINs.
Currently, there are 17.52 lakh registered TIN holders in the country and NBR expected to bring them except some dormant TIN holders under e-TIN system.
They said that they got slower responses mainly due to ongoing political instability in the country. The revenue board also failed to implement scheduled monitoring
and awareness activities in this regard across the country due to volatile situation.
Taxpayers have also been requesting to extend the scope, they said.
In this context, the revenue board with consent of the finance minister extended the time line for providing e-TINs.
-With New Age input
