Tax department hit hard on Innocent Citizen yet Again

Recently Income tax department has issued communication to taxpayer who had not filed their return of Income for the financial year ended  March 31, 2018.  Following are the due date which Income tax department prescribed.

Ø  July 31, 2018 extended till August 31, 2018

Ø  December 31, 2018 with fine of Rs. 5000 u/s 234E.

Ø  March 31, 2019 with fine of Rs. 10000 u/s 234E

Thus taxpayer have time till March 31, 2019 to file their tax return .  It should be noted that in maximum cases that  tax department has already received the tax by way of TDS and what is left out from taxpayer was only compliances of filing tax return for which they have already started collecting fine under section 234E of the Income tax act. 

However, before March 31, 2019,tax department started issuing communication for non-compliances of tax return  and accordingly tax payer has been provided time line of 21 days only even though as per statute time limit is upto March 31, 2019.

The intention of tax department is good as they want more and more people to file their tax return, however, the way it has been done is causing hardship to innocent citizen.   The finance ministry should re-visit the process and make some improvement  which may reduce the hardship.

The author is available at his email ID taxbymanish@yahoo.com  for your valuable feedback.