Income tax portal is down. Service unavailable: The deadline to file one’s Income Tax Return (ITR) is July 31, 2023, giving taxpayers just one week to do so. The
income tax division has been advising people to file their forms as soon as possible rather than waiting until the last
minute in order to avoid late fines or penalties. Meanwhile, taxpayers have been complaining of issues on the e-filing
portal while filing income tax returns ahead of the last date, demanding an extension in the ITR filing deadline. ITR
The last date for individuals to file income tax returns (ITR) is July 31, 2023, provided their accounts do not need to be audited, such as salaried persons. Every year, individuals look for an extension of the income tax return (ITR) filing deadline. This is because they essentially get 45 days to file their income tax returns even though the ITR forms are generally notified at the start of the financial year.
There is a need to extend the deadline for filing income tax returns permanently to provide individuals sufficient time to file correctly. Here is why.
Firstly, even though the ITR forms are notified by the tax department at the start of the year or even prior to that, the utilities to file ITRs or online forms for ITR filing are usually enabled in mid-May or at the start of June. For instance, this year, ITR forms were notified in February, but the Excel utility was released in April and online ITR-1 form was enabled on May 20 with pre-filled data.
Secondly, Form 16 and Form 16A are the TDS certificates that are essential documents for ITR filing. Form 16 is a TDS certificate issued by an employer with details of the total salary income paid and tax deducted on it in a financial year. Similarly, Form 16A is a TDS certificate issued by banks and other financial institutions for TDS deducted on interest, dividend and other incomes.
The last date to issue these TDS certificates is June 15. This due date was extended by 15 days by the Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) in 2017. The 2017 notification extended the due date of filing TDS returns by employers, banks and other financial institutions from May 15 to May 31. Due to this extension, the last date to issue Form 16/16A became June 15 from May 31 earlier. This extension provided more time to file TDS returns, however, the subsequent time limit to file
ITR was not extended. An individual which used to have almost 60 days to file their ITR now have 45 days to do the same.
Most of the taxpayers, including salaried taxpayers, rely on the TDS certificates provided by their employers for the purpose of filing their income tax returns. However, considering that the last day for filing TDS returns is May 31, the tax deductors (banks and employers) issue TDS certificates generally by June 15. As such, taxpayers would have 45 days till the due date of July 31 for furnishing their income tax returns.