Team Herald
PANJIM: The faceless assessment scheme introduced as the biggest direct tax reform to reduce human interaction and rein in corruption is in throes of major constraints with over 6.20 lakh cases of Goans pending for nearly three years causing hardships and harassment to honest taxpayers in the State
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To add to their woes, the penalty procedures and disposal of cases were done without understanding the provisions of section 5A in several cases resulting in high-pitched backend demand.
There are thousands of appeals pending unattended for more than three years especially for high pitched demands in the State thus causing harassment to honest income tax payers. These facts are before the Assessing Office, Commissioner of Income Tax (Appeals), National Faceless Appeal Centre and the Principal Commissioner of Income Tax. But not action has been taken, it was informed.
Goa is the only State in the country which is following Common Civil Code and due to this Section 5A of Finance Act was inserted with retrospective effect from April 1, 1963. This section allows income to be apportioned equally between spouses.;
Though a provision of 5A had been inserted a corresponding backend processing system was not integrated by the Centralised Processing Centre, Bengaluru for ensuring a seamless computerised processing of tax returns. This lacunae was causing undue hardships to taxpayers in the form of unwarranted demands and or withholding of tax refunds.
According to information available, since March 2022, as many as 6,20,352 faceless penalty cases were pending out of which 2,16,938 cases were kept in abeyance and 2,39,880 were disposed of. In 2023, about 1,413 faceless appeals were pending with the IncomeTax Office, Panjim. This information was provided in Parliament.
The tax payers whose average gross receipt had never exceeded more than Rs 3 lakh and whose gross capital had not exceeded more than Rs 20 lakh had been issued a notice to pay a figure of nearly Rs 8 crore.
The honest taxpayers are demanding that faceless assessments should not be insensitive and inhuman for them. They stated that increased litigation costs, a large backlog of unsettled income tax refunds and various cases of baseless demands was causing hardships tothem.
The honest taxpayers have appealed to the Union Finance Minister to investigate and to initiate action as per law and also to give necessary administrative direction to the Principal Commissioner of Income Tax (PCIT), Goa.
