As per the return filing data shared by Sitharaman, the number of persons who filed income tax returns during the last four years has shown an increase. Over 7.40 crore ITRs were filed in 2022-23, of which over 5.16 crore had zero tax liability
New Delhi:
Number of entities, including individuals, who filed income tax returns increased by 6.18 per cent in 2022-23 to over 7.40 crore, of which about 5.16 crore declared zero tax liability.
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said on Monday. “There has been a 6.18 per cent increase in the number of persons filing Income Tax Returns in F.Y. 2022-23 as compared to persons in F.Y. 2021-22,” she said in the Lok Sabha.
India’s gross direct tax collection grew 20.33 per cent to over Rs 19.68 lakh crore in 2022-23 fiscal.
As per the return filing data shared by Sitharaman, the number of persons who filed income tax returns during the last four years has shown an increase. Over 7.40 crore ITRs were filed in 2022-23, of which over 5.16 crore had zero tax liability.
Similarly, for 2021-22 fiscal, over 6.94 crore ITRs were filed, of which over 5.05 crore had zero tax liability.Over 6.72 crore and 6.47 crore ITRs were filed in 2020-21 and 2019-20 fiscal years.
Of this, over 4.84 crore and 2.90 crore assessees had zero tax liability.
The Government has taken several steps, like expansion of the scope of TDS/TCS, simplification of personal I-T, prefiling of ITRs, updated returns, new form 26AS and non-filers monitoring system, which has helped in adding taxpayers.
“E-mails and SMS reminders are issued to taxpayers to file their ITRs and pay their due taxes,” Sitharaman said, adding the tax department is also undertaking publicity campaigns to raise awareness about filing tax returns.
Meanwhile,more than four crore income tax returns (ITRs) have been filed so far for fiscal 2022-23 and more than half of them have been processed leading to issuance of 80 lakh refunds, CBDT chairperson Nitin Gupta said on Monday.
Gupta also said that the “shortage of manpower (in the department) at every level was impeding our efforts to give even better results” as he urged the Union finance minister for a “quick approval” of the department’s cadre restructuring proposal.
He was speaking at an event held here to mark the 164th Income Tax Day.
The Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) is the administrative authority for the I-T department.
Gupta said the direct tax collection, that includes personal income tax and corporate tax among others, has been making “remarkable” strides as the department collected more than Rs 16.61 lakh crore in taxes during 2022-23 fiscal and this was 17.67 per cent higher as compared to the preceding year.
This collection “surpassed” both the budget and revised estimates set by the government for revenue collections under the direct taxes category and this is a testament of the hard work of our cadre, he said.
“We are currently growing at the rate of 16 per cent (for direct tax collection) over the last year. We had 7.78 crore income tax returns filed during 2022-23 financial year and this was an increase of 6.5 per cent over the previous year,” the CBDT head said.
This year, till now, more than four crore ITRs have been filed already and this is four days earlier than the last time, he said.
In the current year, over 50 per cent returns have been processed already and more than 80 lakh refunds have been issued, Gupta said.
The deadline for filing ITRs for different categories of taxpayers is a week away at July 31.
He said the department was working on the guidelines set by the finance minister of ensuring “quicker processing of returns and speedy issue of refunds”.
“We have reduced the ITR processing to just 16 days and more than 42 per cent of the ITRs were processed in one day during the last fiscal,” he said.