CBDT orders taxmen to add 1.25 crore new taxpayers this fiscal
The Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) has directed the Income Tax Department to make focused efforts to significantly increase the tax base in the current financial year of 2017-18 and add at least 1.25 crore new return filers this fiscal.
The target, the CBDT directive accessed by PTI said, is to add 1.25 crore new I-T return filers. A new I-T return filer is defined as a person who has not filed return in the previous years but is liable to do so under the law. The taxman has to add such entities and get them do the filing of their I-T returns.
The Hyderabad and the Pune regions of the department have been given the highest targets to add 12.8 lakh and 11.8 lakh new filers respectively.
They are followed by Chennai with 10.47 lakh new filers and Chandigarh at 10.41 lakh fresh filers.
The
plan
to
widen
the
tax
base
in
the
country
was
also
discussed
and
finalised
during
the
recently
concluded
'Rajswa
Gyansangam' conference
of
top
I-T
officials
held
here.
The
CBDT,
in
an
official
statement,
had
said
during
the
conference
"strategiesing
of
tax
base
were
discussed
in
detail
with
special
focus
on
verification
of
data
collected
during
demonetisation
and
statement
of
financial
transactions
(SFT)."
"The CBDT aims to add a sizeable number of new taxpayers in the current fiscal. It was directed that special focus be given to popularise the Operation Clean Money portal such that an environment of voluntary compliance can be created," it had said.
As per official data, the total number of all returns (electronic + paper) filed during the financial year 2016-17 was 5.43 crore, 17.3 per cent more than the returns filed during the 2015-16 fiscal.
PTI