Recently, many individuals and companies, who may have hidden some income from the tax department, have come under the taxman’s lens following an elaborate investigation based on application of data analytics and machine learning and robust data sharing between various tax authorities.

According to a report in the Economic Times, the government has used statistics of the last two financial years to create the audit checklist. Tax departments have used big data analytics in the last few years. The tool is deployed to find outliers in any industry, and the gap from industry based average taxes is used to determine targets for further scrutiny.

The indirect tax department has issued notices to several individuals and companies in July after it found discrepancies in their income tax and indirect tax filings, the financial daily mentioned.

Finance Ministry is expecting that tech issues of the new Income Tax (I-T) portal will be resolved soon and the website will function normally by the first week of August, sources informed CNBC-TV18.
"Infosys and Finance Ministry are taking a daily update on improvements," sources said.
Infosys was in 2019 awarded a contract to develop the new income tax filing system to reduce processing time for returns from 63 days to one day and expedite refunds.
Income Tax Department had launched its new e-filing portal-- http://www.incometax.gov.in -- on June 7, 2021. Since then, technical glitches continue to mar the functioning of the new income tax portal as certain key utilities like e-proceedings and digital signature certificates are not yet functional.
Infosys is still working on resolving all the issues that taxpayers are facing on the new Income Tax portal, a project that was contracted to the IT bellwether and for which the government has sanctioned Rs 4241 crore. The company has said that several issues have been resolved and that the new platform has seen 10 lakh Income Tax returns filed so far.

Income tax payment and ITR filing rules for earnings from cryptocurrency trading and investment 2021: Indians have invested billions of dollars in cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin, Dogecoin, Ethereum, Binance, Ripple, Matic, and other over popular coins. The trading volume of cryptocurrencies has increased multifold since the nationwide lockdown of last year.

According to a recent Bloomberg report, Indian investment in cryptocurrencies grew from $923 million in April 2020 to nearly $ 6.6 billion in May 2021. The crypto investment by Indians has grown despite no clear regulation on this from the RBI or the Government.
The RBI had tried to impose a kind of ban in 2018 by restricting banking facilities to crypto exchanges, which was later ruled out by the Supreme Court. Since then, the Indian engagement in crypto trading and investment has grown manifold, particularly after Covid-induced lockdowns confined salaried youths to their homes, leaving them with ample time to explore new ways of making money fast.

As the tax filing season for AY 2021-22 starts, many crypto investors in the country may be worried about the tax implications of their earnings from crypto-currency trading and investments in the previous financial year. Here’s an explainer for them

The income tax department has granted further relaxation in the electronic filing of forms 15CA and 15CB in view of difficulties reported by taxpayers in the filing of forms online on the new e-filing portal http://incometax.gov.in.

Taxpayers can now file Form 15 CA and Form 15 CB manually till August 15, the Ministry of Finance said. The decision was taken in view of rampant glitches on the new income tax filing online portal.

"As per the Income-tax Act, 1961, there is a requirement to furnish Form 15CA/15CB electronically. Presently, taxpayers upload the Form 15CA, along with the Chartered Accountant Certificate in Form 15CB, wherever applicable, on the e-filing portal, before submitting the copy to the authorized dealer for any foreign remittance," the ministry said on Monday.
"In view of the difficulties reported by taxpayers in electronic filing of Income Tax Forms 15CA/15CB on the portal, www.incometax.gov.in, it has been decided that taxpayers can submit the aforesaid Forms in manual format to the authorised dealers till August 15th, 2021. Authorised dealers are advised to accept such Forms till August 15th, 2021 for the purpose of foreign remittances," the Finance Ministry further added.

Pension funds have been missing out on good opportunities to invest in initial public offerings but soon pension fund managers will be allowed to invest in IPOs. Comprehensive guidelines on the matter are expected within a week. More on that story and other headlines.

Centre mulls Ordinance for past tax assessment as litigation mounts

The government is exploring legal options, including bringing an Ordinance, to tackle the problem of income-tax litigation on reassessment notices under old, time-barred norms, according to official sources. This has come in the wake of writ petitions filed by companies and individuals in recent weeks to challenge the validity of the notices issued by the tax department between April 1 and June 30 and under the old norms.

The Indian government has been extolled for the many new initiatives on the digital front that has been introduced encompassing various aspects of the economy. Digitalisation has taken the world by storm and India has also been in the forefront of introducing new digital measures across the economy. This year’s Budget was also a digital budget. The government has also introduced measures for all the assessments up to the Income-tax Appellate Tribunal (ITAT) level, to be faceless.

This is being achieved with an objective to achieve ease of compliance and reduce discretion. These measures are very humble and are indeed sincere attempts to increase the overall efficiency of the operations and increase productivity. However, they bring with it their own set of challenges as digitalization is a change which may probably face most resistance by a whole generation seeing themselves struggling to keep pace with the ways of operating in the new walks of life.

India Post is now offering an option to pay income tax returns (ITR) at nearest post office Common Services Centres (CSC) counters, in what could be good news for lakhs of salaried taxpayers across the country.


Taking it to Twitter, India Post said that taxpayers can easily access ITR services at nearby post office CSC counter. “Now no need to travel far to file your income tax returns. You can easily access income tax return services at your nearest post office CSC counter. #AapkaDostIndiaPost,” India post tweeted.

Infosys on Wednesday said it is focused on "expeditiously" resolving issues related to the new income tax portal and termed it as the "single largest priority" for the company at the moment.

Infosys top management said that many of the issues around performance and stability have been addressed, and that about 10 lakh ITRs (income tax returns) have been filed so far.


"We are working extremely hard in making sure that all of the features are being delivered. We are working expeditiously...Several of the functionalities are already working, there is a large number of returns that are being filed...there is work done in making sure that all of the stability and the performance is coming together," Infosys CEO and MD Salil Parekh told reporters in a virtual briefing.

A month after its launch and two weeks after the finance minister reviewed its functioning, technical glitches continue to mar the functioning of the new income tax portal as certain key utilities like e-proceedings and digital signature certificate are not yet functional, say chartered accountants.

Also, some overseas firms have been facing problems in logging into the portal, they said. Even after two weeks of the meeting and over a month of the portal launch, users still continue to encounter multiple problems like unable to file I-T returns for past years, download intimation notice u/s 143(1) for AY 2019-20 and earlier years, and Form- 3 under ''Vivad se Vishwas Scheme'' is not visible on the portal.

When contacted, the Income Tax department said it is continuously engaged with the developer Infosys to expedite resolution of issues like log-in and ITR filing on the I-T portal.

When contacted, the Income Tax department said it is continuously engaged with the developer Infosys to expedite resolution of issues like log-in and ITR filing on the I-T portal.

The much-touted new income tax portal ''www.incometax.gov.in’ had a bumpy start from the day of its launch on June 7 as it continued to face tech glitches, which prompted Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman to call a meeting on June 22 with officials of Infosys which has developed the new website.

The I-T department said presently, users are reporting some issues related to non-availability of Income Tax Return 3, 5, 6 and 7 and rectification functionality, issues in ITR filing, e-verification or login to the portal in certain cases or technical issues in filing of certain statutory forms.

On July 1, the Organisation of Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) adopted a high-level statement containing an outline of the possible solution to address the tax challenges arising from the digitalisation of the economies. India, which is a signatory to the statement, has been consistent in its stand to equitably tax the digital economy.

With the advent of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government in 2014, India’s pitch for accelerated digitalisation was evenly matched with its quest to tax the growing digital economy, primarily driven by the fact that despite being one of the largest markets, most of the technology giants did not pay income tax in India.

India’s First Move

While a consensus eluded the major nations on the appropriate manner of taxation of the digital economy, India, introduced a new concept called the equalisation levy (EL) in the 2016 Budget. India and Israel were among the earliest countries to unilaterally levy a digital tax on the foreign companies. India levied a 6 percent tax on the B2B online advertisement revenues of the foreign e-commerce companies.

As many as 24,781 responses have been received on the e-proceedings functionality and about 40,000 ITRs are being filed daily on the new I-T portal, the Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) said as it addresses on war footing the technical glitches facing the new site.


In reply to a PTI email on chartered accountants saying that users still experience glitches even a month after the launch of the I-T portal, CBDT said users are reporting some issues related to non-availability of Income Tax Return 3, 5, 6 and 7 and rectification functionality, issues in ITR filing, e-verification or logging in to the portal in certain cases and corrective measures are being taken.

The corrective measures are being taken based on feedback from taxpayers, tax professionals and representatives of ICAI to provide taxpayers with a smooth e-filing experience, it said.

"The Department is continuously engaged with Infosys to expedite the resolution of any pending issues and to make available all balance functionalities at the earliest," the CBDT, which is the apex body on income tax matters, said.

It said presently, about 8-10 lakh people are logging into the new portal and on an average 40,000 I-T Returns are being filed every day.

The Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) has notified the new rules regarding computation of short-term capital gains (STCG) and written down value (WDV) where depreciation on goodwill has been obtained, potentially increasing tax liabilities on firms that have undergone mergers or acquisitions in recent years.

Finance Act, 2021, had amended that ‘goodwill’ will no more be regarded as an “intangible asset” and depreciation would be not be available with effect from April 2020. The Income Tax Act, 1961, was amended to the extent that goodwill will have to be removed from the block of asset as on April 1, 2020, such value to be reduced will be cost of goodwill, net of depreciation claimed till date.
“Transactions done in the past 5 years in sectors such as pharma, life sciences, start-ups lining for IPO would have to closely evaluate the financial impact of this amendment,” said Aravind Srivatsan, partner & tax Leader, Nangia Andersen LLP. Companies, where typically, the goodwill has not been substantially depreciated by April 2020, need to immediately quantify their tax impact, Srivatsan said.

The income tax department has issued refunds worth Rs 37,050 crore to more than 17.92 lakh taxpayers between April 1 to July 5. Of this, personal income tax refund stood at Rs 10,408 crore, while that of corporates was Rs 26,642 crore.

“CBDT issues refunds of over Rs 37,050 crore to more than 17.92 lakh taxpayers between 1st April 2021 to 05th July 2021.

Income tax refunds of Rs 10,408 crore have been issued in 16,89,063 cases & corporate tax refunds of Rs 26,642 crore have been issued in 1,03,088 cases,” the I-T department tweeted.

The Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) has notified the new rules regarding computation of short-term capital gains (STCG) and written down value (WDV) where depreciation on goodwill has been obtained, potentially increasing tax liabilities on firms that have undergone mergers or acquisitions in recent years.

Finance Act, 2021, had amended that ‘goodwill’ will no more be regarded as an “intangible asset” and depreciation would be not be available with effect from April 2020. The Income Tax Act, 1961, was amended to the extent that goodwill will have to be removed from the block of asset as on April 1, 2020, such value to be reduced will be cost of goodwill, net of depreciation claimed till date.
“Transactions done in the past 5 years in sectors such as pharma, life sciences, start-ups lining for IPO would have to closely evaluate the financial impact of this amendment,” said Aravind Srivatsan, partner & tax Leader, Nangia Andersen LLP. Companies, where typically, the goodwill has not been substantially depreciated by April 2020, need to immediately quantify their tax impact, Srivatsan said.

Imposition of liability to deduct tax on purchase of goods with effect from July 1, 2021 has witnessed firms going back to the drawing board to underpin their obligations by discerning the interplay between applicability of tax deduction (TDS) provisions on purchase of goods, inserted by Union Budget 2021 and tax collection (TCS) provisions on sale of goods inserted earlier vide Finance Act 2020.

One of the questions that have landed tax deductors in a quandary is whether these provisions should be tested for transactions in shares and securities. This is due to absence of definition of the term ‘goods’ in Income Tax Act. While the Sale of Goods Act, 1932(SOGA) defines ‘goods’ to include stocks and shares within its genre, a matching definition in Central Goods and Services Tax Act 2017 (CGSTA) excludes securities from its ambit.

G20 finance ministers meeting in Venice on Friday and Saturday could rally the world's top economies behind a global plan to tax multinationals more fairly that has already been hashed out among 131 countries representing 90 percent of world output.

On the face of it, the Group of 20 -- the world's 19 biggest economies plus the European Union -- have already backed the framework for global tax reform, agreed on July 1 among members of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) alongside China and India.

But negotiations continue behind the scenes to convince low-tax EU countries such as Hungary, Ireland and Estonia, who declined to sign up to the OECD deal to tax global companies at a rate of at least 15 percent.

The Karnataka High Court ruling has turned the spotlight on the issue of companies being allowed to carry forward profits or losses from “non-business income” or from non-core operations.

The recent ruling said if a company, while paying taxes or preparing financial statements, had categorised a certain amount as “other business income”, that amount could be used to carry forward profits or losses.

According to accounting rules, companies are allowed to carry forward profits and losses in their financial statements for up to eight years in most cases. This accounting treatment affects the company’s profitability and also the tax outgo.

In the case at the Karnataka High Court, a steel company had set off its carried forward business loss with capital gains arising from the transfer of a business asset — a piece of land. The tax department had objected to this treatment.

The Central Board of Direct Taxes has extended the time for processing refunds in non-scrutiny cases for assessment year 2017-18 up to September 30.

In an order issued on July 5, the Board said cases had been brought to its attention where due to technical reasons, returns for various assessment years up to the assessment year 2017-18 that were filed validly could not be processed, and intimation was not provided to the taxpayer. This had led to a situation where the taxpayer was unable to get a legitimate refund.

"To mitigate genuine hardship being faced by taxpayers due to this issue, the Board hereby relaxes the time-frame prescribed and directs that all validly filed returns up to assessment year 2017-18 with refund claims, which could not be processed and have become time-barred, subject to exceptions, can be processed now with prior approval of principal chief commissioner or chief commissioner of income tax," the Board said in the order.

The Income Tax Department on Monday extended the deadline till July 15 for manual filing of forms related to foreign remittances. As the new I-T portal faced technical issues after its launch on June 7 and users complained of glitches, the department had allowed manual filings of Form 15CA/15CB (required for foreign remittances) with banks till June 30.

"It has now been decided to extend the aforesaid date to July 15, 2021. In view thereof, taxpayers can now submit the said forms in manual format to the authorised dealers till 15th July, 2021," the Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) said in a statement.

As per the Income Tax Act, 1961, there is a requirement to furnish Form 15CA/15CB electronically.

The back-to-back lockdowns have made people realise the importance of having a passive income source and in search of that, Indians have tried different things to generate good money. Some have started their own business from home and some have started investing in IPOs and real estate. However, a lot of people choose to invest in cryptocurrencies. As per a report, over ten million crypto investors have been added in India in 2021.

It seems hesitation about crypto culture is receding at a steady pace in India. People are finding great opportunities with great returns on investment (ROI ). However, despite the humongous growth in the number of crypto currency traders and investors, people are worried on the taxation front and the future of the asset in India. Let’s talk about the tax implications on cryptocurrency in India. We would like to inform you that all the provided details are for knowledge purposes only.
The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has not yet granted Bitcoin or any other cryptocurrency the status of legal tender in India. Hence, there are no clear rules or guidelines defining taxability for cryptocurrencies, which calls for specific clarification from the Income Tax (I-T) department.