The Income Tax Department has opened special counters to facilitate filing of returns of income of salaried employees and pensioners in the city
Filing your Income Tax (IT) returns has become just as easy as cricketer Rahul Dravid promised. The Income Tax Department has opened special counters to facilitate filing of returns of income of salaried employees and pensioners in the city. These special counters, numbering a cool 100, were inaugurated by Mr. Dravid at Gayathri Vihar, Palace Grounds, here on Wednesday.
I. Suresh Babu, Chief Commissioner of Income Tax III, Bangalore, said that these 100 counters had been set up for easy and hassle-free filing of returns. Other than these, 10 separate bulk counters, three counters for senior citizens and 16 verification counters have also been set up. To help citizens file returns, there also will be automated teller machines (ATMs), debit/credit card swipe machines and bank extension counters at the venue. Tax volunteers and tax return preparers will also be on hand to help the citizens. These counters will accept tax returns between 9.30 a.m. to 5 p.m. on all days, including holidays and Sundays, till July 31.
Speaking at the inauguration, Mr. Dravid said one usually gets worried if one is contacted by the IT Department. “I have been associated with the department for long time and [it is providing] an opportunity to tax payers to file their returns in a comfortable, easy and transparent manner. Filing tax returns can be a little intimidating, but the department’s mela makes the process simple and easy,” he said.
K. Sathyanarayana, Chief Commissioner of Income Tax I, Bangalore, told reporters later the department was confident of collecting Rs. 53,430 crore as income tax this year (2012-13). It has already collected Rs. 8,870 crore so far. Last year, the collection touched Rs. 45,819 crore. The number of assessees is 19.7 lakh (as on April 1, 2012) in the Karnataka region.
The national level target is Rs. 5.7 lakh crore, of which Rs. 86,000 crore has already been collected. With technology and introduction of e-filing of IT returns, the cost of collection had come down. “It currently stands at 0.64 per cent, the lowest in the country. Another interesting fact is that the Karnataka and Goa Region achieved 14 per cent growth rate of tax collections in 2011-12 vis-à-vis all India growth rate of 9.39 per cent.”
TDS collection
The Tax Deducted at Source (TDS) collections were Rs. 15,000 crore last year. Of the Rs. 20,000 crore target this year, the department had already achieved Rs. 5,000 crore. “Around 10 per cent of the total TDS contribution to the national exchequer is from Karnataka. Two sectors that contribute a lot are software (36 per cent) and banks (26 per cent),” Mr. Sathyanarayana said.
He said that e-filing had become a breeze with the Centralised Processing Centre (CPC) and time taken to process refunds had reduced to just 40 days. He said that the number of returns processed by CPC during 2011-12 was 1.32 crore and number of refunds issued was 47.14 lakh amounting to Rs. 13,458 crore. To make filing tax returns easier, the department had set up Ayakar Seva Kendras in Bangalore, Mangalore and Hubli last year. This year, these kendras will be opened in Tumkur and Raichur, he added.
