With the new financial year under way, income tax return filing has picked up pace and the cut-off date is no longer far off. For salaried taxpayers the calendar matters even more, because they have to wrap up their returns by 31 जुलाई without fail. Most employers have already handed over Form-16 to their staff, which means the path to filing is clear. But if you assume that Form-16 on its own is enough to get the job done, that is exactly where things can go wrong.
Why Form-16 Is Not the Whole Story
Before you file, cross-checking all your figures against AIS and Form 26AS is just as important as filing the return itself. Skip this step and the Income Tax Department can send you a notice. The department rolled out the Annual Information Statement (AIS) and Form 26AS only a few years ago. Both records carry a complete picture of a taxpayer's details, which is why every taxpayer is asked to reconcile their own numbers against them. If a mismatch shows up anywhere in these documents, the concerned taxpayer may be served a notice. On top of that, even after you have filed, your refund can get stuck midway.
What Goes Into Your AIS
Think of the Annual Information Statement as a detailed ledger of a full year's transactions. As the name suggests, it lays out the taxpayer's earnings and spending for the entire year. Its scope covers your salary and income from other sources, the savings parked in your bank, interest earned on FDs, money invested in shares and mutual funds along with the returns on it, dividends, and even the record of any property bought or sold.
The Job Done by Form 26AS
Form 26AS, issued by the Income Tax Department, is a tax statement linked to your PAN. It not only carries full details of the TDS and TCS deducted on your income, but also a complete account of any advance tax or self-assessment tax you have paid. When you sit down to file, all of this information will show up in your Form-16 as well. So the smart move is to match every detail in your Form-16 against these two forms before filing, and to enter only the correct figures in the ITR form.
How to Stay Clear of a Notice
The first step is to line up the details in Form-16, Form 26AS and AIS and compare them against one another before you file.
- Enter a figure in your ITR only once the income and tax deduction match across all three documents.
- If your AIS shows an entry or detail for a transaction you never made, fix it first using the AIS feedback feature on the income tax portal.
- If you have income that does not appear in the AIS, declare it in your ITR anyway, so that you do not run into trouble later or end up facing a notice.
