Come March, I suffer from lack of appetite and spend sleepless nights, thinking about the income tax I have to pay. Awake or asleep, college or home, I am constantly being haunted by the sceptre of income tax. I am like a butterfly throughout the year but in March, I have butterflies in the stomach.
Only yesterday, I was teaching Browning's Prospice in my poetry class and came to the line where the poet was talking about ‘life's arrears of pain, darkness and cold' he would like to pay glad at the time of his death. I left Browning then and there and started worrying about my arrears that had been paid this income year and the additional tax I have to pay on account of those arrears.
Back to some math
In my next class, I gave some class work to my students so that I could meddle with the figures in my income statement for the thirteenth time, hoping to see the tax reduced. But to my total dismay, every time it increased. I was an idiot to feel happy to have left mathematics behind in my high school, little knowing that mathematics would never leave me and take revenge on me for leaving it.
So I had to start all over again. First of all, came the most trickiest column — PAN (Permanent Account Number). Alas! I remember very well the day I received my PAN by courier. I was puffed up with pride and felt honoured as if it were a medal conferred on me for my services in teaching! Not until my senior colleagues educated me about the woes it would lead me to did I realise that it had been cleverly invented by the Income Tax Department to trace and pin you down to the Last Day of Judgment. Once you receive your PAN, there is no salvation for you, either in this world or the other. The terrorists attack you with their weapons and the Income Tax Department attacks you with your PAN. You can neither live nor die in peace.
In the next column, I added income from all sources which gave me a startling figure, almost incredible, “What did I do with all this money?” Next came the Head ‘Savings' which shocked me even more as I have yet to pay LIC and NSS premiums. Still next column irritated me as it asked me to subtract accrued interest on NSCs (National Saving Certificates) Fine! First add and then subtract! “What good it served Sirs/ Madams?” I felt like asking the authorities. As there is no column where questions can be asked, I murmured Tennyson's lines with some alteration.
Mine is not to question why
Mine is but to pay (tax) and die.
After finding my way through the maze of income tax rules and regulations, I finally arrived at the saturation point — ‘Net Tax Payable.' I scribbled there a figure that suited my budget and submitted it in the office, heaving a sigh of relief.
An unwelcome missive
On reaching home, I found a letter addressed to me. It had been ages since I received a letter in this age of telecommunications. I opened it and felt happy to read ‘Dear Madam.' But the contents were far from dear to me. The letter was from the income tax officer. He was glad (?) to know I was an income tax assessee of ward no. so and so which comes in his jurisdiction. The further news he gave me was like hurling a grenade at me. Balance of tax in bulk was due from me from my previous year's income and so it was mandatory for me to pay it with interest before March. Enclosed was a form — Saral II (God knows how saral it is!) in which I had to file revised income tax returns.
The letter ended with a logo — ‘File Today and Smile Tomorrow.' Well said, dear officer, but how I wish I could make you understand that as I am already staggering under the burden of income tax, there is very little hope I shall be alive tomorrow!
(The writer's email ID is jampalavijaya@gmail.com)
