Big relief for taxpayers! Centre extends deadline for filing income tax return for FY20 till December 31

New Delhi: Providing further relief to millions of individual tax payers, the Finance Ministry on Saturday extended the deadline for filing returns by individual taxpayers for FY 2019-20 by a month till December 31.

For those taxpayers whose accounts need to be audited, the Income-Tax Return filing deadline has been extended by two months till January 31, 2021, the Finance Ministry said in a statement on Saturday.

It may be noted that the government had in May extended the date for filing ITR for FY2019-20 from July 31 to November 30, to give compliance relief to taxpayers.

In a statement, the Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) said, "The due date for furnishing of Income Tax Returns for the taxpayers [for whom the due date (i.E. Before the extension by the said notification) as per the Act was July 31, 2020] has been extended to December 31, 2020."

The due date for furnishing of ITR for the taxpayers, who are required to get their accounts audited (for whom the due date as per the I-T Act is October 31, 2020), has been extended to January 31, 2021, it added.

The CBDT said the deadlines have been extended in order to "provide more time to taxpayers for furnishing of Income Tax Returns".

Meanwhile, the Income Tax Department has issued a lengthy instruction manual running into hundreds of pages for filling up the tax returns for assessment year 2020-21.

The Income Tax Department has issued a detailed step by step reckoner for filing tax returns to be submitted under different heads.

These instructions are guidelines to help the taxpayers for filling the particulars in Income-tax Return Form-1 for the Assessment Year 2020-21 relating to the Financial Year 2019-2020.

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