Budget 2019: Tax returns filing mandatory if you spend over Rs 2 lakh on foreign travel

The government has made income tax return filing mandatory for account holders with high-value transactions. The rule also applies to people spending over Rs 2 lakh on foreign travel or those who pay Rs 1 lakh as electricity bill in a year.

"It is proposed to make return filing compulsory for persons, who have deposited more than Rs 1 crore in a current account in a year, or who have expended more than Rs 2 lakh on foreign travel or more than Rs 1 lakh on electricity consumption in a year," Sitharaman said in her speech.

Sitharaman also proposed measures to make filing income tax returns easier. To begin with, she said that "pre-filled tax returns" containing details such as salary income, capital gains from securities, bank interests, tax deductions, dividends and the like will be made available to taxpayers.

The Income Tax Department will provide pre-filled ITR-1 forms that will state your salary, FD interest income, TDS details and tax deductions claimed under Sections 80C to 80U based on your PAN details from Form 26AS, the TDS return filed by your employer and your previous year's ITR.

All this data had to be manually filled by the taxpayer till last year. However, this facility is only available for the ITR-1 form filed online, and the other ITR forms have not been covered yet.

The Form 16 has also been beefed up. Previously, it used to mention gross salary but not the details of tax-exempt allowances and perquisites. Employers now have to provide a detailed break-up of all components, including remuneration received from former employer/s and all tax-related deductions availed of by the employee.

Also read: Budget 2019: Filing income tax returns to be made easier with pre-filled forms

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