Friday, 10 October 2014

Know more about Income Tax Deductions and Exemptions both are different.

Income tax return can be filed by an individual taxpayer in form ITR-1 where the total income consists of the following income:
  • “Salaries” or income in the nature of family pension or
  • “Income form house property”, where assessee does not own more than 1 house property and does not have any brought forward loss under the head; or
  • “Income from other sources”, except winnings from lottery or income from race horses and does not have any loss under the head.
1. It is Provided that the ITR-1 form cannot be used by the person who:
(a) is a resident, other than not ordinarily resident in India within the meaning of sub-section (6) of section 6 and has
i) assets (including financial interest in any entity) located outside India; or
ii) signing authority in any account located outside India;

(b) has claimed any relief of tax u/s 90 or 90A or deduction of tax under section 91; or

(c) has income not chargeable to tax, exceeding Rs. 5,000/-.

2. In your specific case, if you satisfy the above criteria, you can file the return of income in form ITR-1.

3. Exemption and deduction are two commonly used terms many get confused with, and most of the taxpayer can’t differentiate between the two. One needs to understand the difference between the two terms that many people commonly consider as one and the same.
DEDUCTION:The word “deduct” means “to subtract or take away from the total”. Tax deduction allows you to put some of your income to use in certain specified investments or expenses and deduct the amount from your income, thereby lowering your ultimate taxable income. In short, deduction reduces the amount of income which is taxable. Deduction is always on income forming part of your total income.
[Few deduction forming part majority of tax payers are chapter VIA deductions like Deduction u/s 80C towards investments in LIC/PPF/NSC etc, U/s 80D towards health insurance premium, U/s 80E towards education loan interest payment, U/s 80G towards donations, U/s 80DD towards medical treatment of handicapped dependant etc.]

EXEMPTION:
Exemption means “Tax Free”. Exempted income does not form part of your total income on which income tax has to be paid. Another major difference between deduction & exemption is that exempt income doesn’t not form the part of gross total income (GTI).
[Few exemption available to majority of tax payers are life insurance money back, PPF Maturity proceeds, Agricultural income, share of profit from the partnership firm etc]

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