New draft Common Income Tax Return Form

At present, depending upon the type of person and nature of income,  taxpayers are required to furnish their Income-tax Returns in ITR-1 to ITR-7. Income Tax Department, proposes to introduce a common ITR by merging all the existing returns of income except ITR-7. This is in tandem with international best practices. The ITR is customized for taxpayers with applicable schedules based on certain questions answered by the taxpayers. The draft common ITR, based on the above scheme, has been uploaded on www.incometaxindia.gov.in for inputs from stakeholders and general public https://incometaxindia.gov.in/news/common-itr.pdf. The inputs on the draft ITR form may be sent electronically at the email address dirtpl4@nic.in with a copy to dirtpl1@nic.in, latest by 15^th December, 2022.  After taking into account the inputs received from stakeholders, the online utility will be released by the Income-tax Department. 

Note: However, the current ITR 1 and ITR 4 will continue. The income taxpayers will get an option to choose which form they want while filing their tax returns — the proposed common ITR form or the existing form (ITR 1 or ITR 4)

New Common ITR

The scheme of the proposed common ITR is given below. The entire ITR questions and sample ITR is given below

1. Basic information (comprising parts A to E), Schedule for computation of total income (Schedule TI), Schedule for computation of tax (schedule TTI), Details of bank accounts, and a schedule for the tax payments (schedule TXP) is applicable for all taxpayers.
2. The ITR is customized for taxpayers with applicable schedules based on certain questions answered by the taxpayers. (Example given in the image below)
3. The questions have been designed in such a manner and order that if the answer to any question is ‘no’, the other questions linked to this question will not be shown to the taxpayer.
4. Instructions are there to assist in the filing of the return.
5. The proposed ITR has been designed in such a manner that each row contains one distinct value only. This will simplify the return filing process.
6. The utility for the ITR will be rolled out in such a manner that only applicable fields of the schedule will be visible and wherever necessary, the set of fields will appear more than once.

Questions In ITR which will simplify filling ITR

Problems with Current ITRs

At present, depending upon the type of person and nature of income,  taxpayers are required to furnish their Income-tax Returns in ITR-1 to ITR-7.

The current ITRs are in the form of designated forms wherein the taxpayer is mandatorily required to go through all the schedules, irrespective of the fact whether that particular schedule is applicable or not, which increases the time taken to file the ITRs.

Different Types of ITR forms

Why New ITR

The proposed draft ITR takes a relook at the return filing system in tandem with international best practices.

It proposes to introduce a common ITR by merging all the existing returns of income except ITR-7. However, the current ITR-1 and ITR-4 will continue. This will give an option to such taxpayers to file the return either in the existing form (ITR-1 or ITR-4), or the proposed common ITR, at their convenience.

The taxpayer will be required to answer questions which apply to it and fill the schedules linked to those questions where the answer has been given as ‘yes’. This will increase ease of compliance.

The draft common ITR, based on the above scheme, has been uploaded on www.incometaxindia.gov.in for inputs from stakeholders and general public https://incometaxindia.gov.in/news/common-itr.pdf. A sample ITR illustrating step by step approach for filing the ITR and two customised sample ITRs for firm and company have also been provided for illustration.

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The inputs on the draft ITR form may be sent electronically at the email address dirtpl4[at]nic[dot]in with a copy to dirtpl1[at]nic[dot]in, latest by 15^th December, 2022.