ISLAMABAD: The total number of income tax returns (ITRs) filed in India for the assessment year (AY) 2023-24, filed till July 31, 2023 stood at record over 67.7 million, which is 16.1 per cent more than the total ITRs for AY 2022-23 (58.3 million) filed till July 31, 2022.
The data released by the Income-Tax Department India revealed that the department appreciated the taxpayers and tax professionals for making compliances in time, leading to a surge in filing of income-tax returns (ITRs), resulting in a new record of ITRs filed. The total number of ITRs for AY 2023-24 filed till July 31, 2023 are more than 67.7 million, which is 16.1 per cent more than the total ITRs for AY 2022-23 (5.83 crore) filed till July 31, 2022.
The filing of ITRs peaked on July 31, 2023 (due date for salaried taxpayers and other non-tax audit cases) with over 6.433 million ITRs being filed on a single day, i.e., on July 31, 2023. The e-filing portal also observed its highest per hour rate of 496,559 of ITR filing between 5pm to 6pm on 31st July 2023, with highest per second rate of ITR filing of 486 (31-Jul-2023: 16:35:06) and highest per minute rate of ITR filing of 8,622 (31-Jul-2023: 17:54).
The department also received 5.367 million ITRs till July 31, 2023 from first time filers, a fair indication of widening of tax base.
The tax department said that the campaigns on social media along with targeted e-mail and SMS campaigns were launched to encourage the taxpayers to file their ITRs early.
Such concerted efforts led to fruitful results with taxpayers filing their ITRs for AY 2023-24 relatively earlier compared to the corresponding period of the preceding year. During the peak filing period, e-filing portal successfully handled huge traffic providing a seamless experience to taxpayers for filing of ITRs.
The tax department further stated that a large number of taxpayers did their due diligence by comparing data of their financial transactions by viewing their Annual Information Statement (AIS) and Taxpayer Information Summary (TIS).
Further, a new e-pay tax payment platform TIN 2.0 was made available on the e-filing portal, replacing the earlier Protean (NSDL)-based OLTAS payment system. This enabled provision of more user-friendly options for e-payment of taxes and making available more number of options for mode of payments such as internet banking, NEFT/ RTGS, OTC, debit card, payment gateway, and UPI. TIN 2.0 platform has enabled real-time credit of taxes to taxpayers which made ITR filing easier and faster. Over 12.6 million challans have been received through TIN 2.0 payment system in the month of July 2023 itself, while total challans filed through TIN 2.0 since April 1, 2023 stands at 35.6 million.
The e-filing helpdesk team has handled approximately 0.5 million queries from taxpayers in the month of July 2023, supporting the taxpayers proactively during the peak filing period. The support from the helpdesk was provided to taxpayers through inbound calls, outbound calls, live chats, webex, and co-browsing sessions.
Helpdesk team also supported resolution of queries received on the Twitter handle of the department through Online Response Management (ORM), by proactively reaching out to the taxpayers/ stakeholders and assisting them for different issues on near real-time basis.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2023
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