The Swiss Federal Supreme Court has ruled that even if persons who are ultimate beneficiaries have not received any money from secret offshore trusts and numbered bank accounts, the Swiss authorities can still go ahead with sharing such confidential information with India - a stand that has dashed hopes of many resident Indians who were banking on the court to stall, or at least delay, the flow of data to the income-tax department here.

Counsels hired by rich Indians have been arguing before the Swiss courts that such personal financial information has no relevance to the Indian tax office because the latter cannot tax the beneficiaries in the absence of any distribution of funds from foreign trusts.
The top court, however, has laid down in multiple rulings over the last two weeks that it would not sit in judgement on why Indian authorities have sought information and whether they can claim tax on the back of such data. According to the supreme court, Switzerland will share information if India seeks it without judging the data's ultimate relevance and end use.

Income Tax Return (ITR) Filing Rules: The due date for filing the income tax return by individuals (who are not liable to tax audit) is 31st July 2022. It is always advisable to file the return on time because it will not only help in the faster processing of tax refunds but will also reduce the chances of errors on your part. Every year, the Income Tax Department introduces certain changes in the tax-filing process or the tax forms. A taxpayer must know these changes to file an error-free income tax return. Here are the 10 things you should watch out for while filing the income tax return for FY 2021-22 (AY 2022-23).

Jul 19, 2022

While filing income tax return this year, you forgot to download and check the information in your AIS. Suppose there is an error in the AIS which has not been rectified by you, say interest earned from a bank account which was closed two years ago. Since the bank account has already been closed, you will not be earning interest. However, your AIS states that you have earned interest from that bank account during the FY, and it has been not disclosed by you in your ITR form. The tax department will send you an income tax notice with additional tax demand.

The Annual Information Statement (AIS) is a tool that informs taxpayers of the information the tax department has on them. The AIS is a detailed statement that lists all of your financial transactions for a given financial year (FY), and it includes the information required by the Income-tax Act of 1961.The AIS includes information on interest, dividends, stock trades, mutual fund activities, international remittance details, etc. The taxpayer will be able to obtain AIS data in the formats of PDF, JSON, and CSV.

The government is not considering extending the last date for filing income tax returns as it expects most returns to come in by the due date of July 31, a top official said on Friday. Revenue Secretary Tarun Bajaj said over 2.3 crore income returns were filed by July 20 for fiscal 2021-22 and the numbers are picking up. Last fiscal (2020-21), about 5.89 crore ITRs (Income Tax Returns) were filed by the extended due date of December 31, 2021.
"People thought the routine now is that dates will be extended. So they were a little slow in filling the returns initially but now on a daily basis, we are getting between 15 lakhs to 18 lakh returns. This will slightly go up to 25 lakh to 30 lakh returns," he told PTI. Typically, return filers wait till the last day to file returns. "Last time 9-10 per cent filed on last day. Last time, we had over 50 lakh (filing returns on the last date). This time, I have told my people to be ready for 1 crore (returns being filed on the last day)," he said. AS per I-T rules, the deadline for filing ITRs of a fiscal by individual taxpayers who do not need to get their accounts audited is July 31 of the subsequent financial year.

Prompt redressal of taxpayers’ grievances remains the top priority for the tax department, the newly appointed chairman of Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) Nitin Gupta said on Sunday. In his message on the occasion of Income Tax Day, he said the tax department has reported the highest ever tax collection of Rs 14.09 lakh crore in the fiscal year ended March 31, 2022 due to streamlining of policies and processes that eased compliance for taxpayers.“However, we cannot rest on our laurels and need to keep working hard to maintain this momentum,” he said. “Prompt redressal of taxpayers’ grievances in the true spirit of the Taxpayers’ Charter shall remain a top priority area.” CBDT, the tax administration arm of the government, will continue to engage proactively with the taxpayers and other stakeholders and will use their feedback to keep improving processes.

The government on Monday said it has raised a tax demand of Rs 14,820 crore after completing assessment in 368 cases under the black money law dealing with undisclosed foreign income.In a written reply in the Lok Sabha, Finance Minister Nirmala Seetharaman said in the cases related to deposits made in unreported foreign bank accounts in HSBC, undisclosed income of more than Rs 8,468 crore have been brought to tax and penalty of over Rs 1,294 crore has been levied.

Shanta Chatterjee (name changed) is a senior citizen lady getting a family pension. To save taxes, she reduced her investments in bank fixed deposit (FD) and invested in an Equity Linked Savings Scheme (ELSS) on a regular basis for some years, till the interest on FD fell below the taxable limit.However, with the appreciation in family pension, her gross income again became over Rs 5 lakh.