E-filing of ITR: Over 7.5 lakh returns verified, 11 L Aadhaar linked

New Delhi, Aug 9: The Income Tax department's ambitious OTP-based ITR filing system for taxpayers has started on a high note with its portal electronically verifying over 7.5 lakh returns and linking over 11 lakh Aadhaar numbers with the PAN database.

The new e-filing system, enabled last month, allows online verification of a person's Income Tax Returns (ITR) by using either Aadhaar number, internet banking, ATM or email, thereby ending the practice of sending paper acknowledgement to its office in Bengaluru.

An official data shows that in less than a month after the facility was launched on the official portal of the department, it has electronically verified 7,53,677 ITRs while Aadhaar linkages with the Permanent Account Number (PAN) has been achieved in 11,46,581 cases.

"With the e-filing of ITRs to go on till August 31, it is expected more numbers would be added and the e-verified returns could easily go beyond 15 lakh. These are just estimated figures being predicted and only sky is the limit in this domain," a senior I-T officer said.

The online ITR filing portal of the department is available at https://incometaxindiaefiling.gov.in.

According to the rules notified in this regard by the Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) on July 13, any taxpayer, whose income is Rs 5 lakh or below per annum and has no refund claims, he or she can straightaway generate the 'Electronic Verification Code' (EVC) for e-filing and validating their ITR through their registered mobile number and e-mail id with the department.

However, this most simplified option, will be subject to certain "restrictions" which will be prepared by the taxman based on the concerned taxpayer's "risk criteria and profile" in a case-to-case basis.

These new measures would completely eliminate the need of sending the paper acknowledgement, called ITR-V, through post to the I-T Central Processing Centre (CPC) based in Bengaluru. In the other options given, those taxpayers who have internet banking activated can do the e-verification of their ITR.

Once logged in on the banking portal, the taxpayer will be sent EVC to his mobile number provided in the official e-filing web portal of the department which they will put in their ITR for final submission.

The Aadhaar database is also being used by the taxman to verify taxpayers' credentials.

The department initiated these new technology measures in order to fully automate the e-filing system and also to end taxpayers' grievances with regard to their ITR-V not reaching by post, which led to their ITR getting rejected.

PTI