CBDT Extends ITR Deadlines by One Month

The Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) extended by a month, the deadline to file income tax returns (ITRs) for special cases requiring audits. The deadline, which was earlier September 30, is now October 31.

In a tweet, the CBDT said, “On consideration of representations received from across the country, it has been decided to extend the due date for filing of ITRs and Tax Audit Reports from 30th September, 2019 to 31st of October, 2019 in respect of persons whose accounts are required to be audited.”

The tweet further said that a formal notification in this regard will follow soon.

‘Special cases requiring audits’ are those ITRs which are to be filed by those entities that are assessed under Section 44AB of the Income Tax (I-T) Act. The entities include companies, partnership firms, proprietorship among others and require their accounts to be audited before filing. Individuals like a working partner, too, fall, under this category.

Earlier, over 5.65 crore returns were filed by taxpayers for the financial year 2018-19, till August 31, 2019, which was the last date to file ITRs for the said financial year. In this case, too, the CBDT had extended the deadline to August 31 from the original July 31 as taxpayers were facing a lot of issues in filing their returns by the latter date.

The Central Board of Direct Taxes is the apex body of the Income Tax (I-T) Department. Its main responsibility is to enforce various direct tax laws, the most important of which is the Income-tax Act, 1961, to collect revenue for the Government of India.