New Delhi: The income tax department under ministry of finance on Friday said that more than 7.28 crore income tax returns or ITRs for AY 2024-25 filed till the end of July 31, 2024, up by a 7.5 per cent from the 6.77 crore ITRs for AY 2023-24 filed in the corresponding period in the preceding year.
“Out of the total ITRs of 7.28 crore filed for AY 2024-25, 5.27 crore have been filed in the new tax regime compared to 2.01 crore ITRs filed in the old tax regime. Thus, about 72 percent of taxpayers have opted for the new tax regime, while 28 per cent continue to be in the old tax regime,” the department said in a statement.
The filing of ITRs peaked on July 31, 2024 — the last date for salaried taxpayers and other non-tax audit cases, with over 69.92 lakh ITRs having been filed on a single day. The department also received 58.57 lakh ITRs from first-time filers, a fair indication of the widening of the tax base.
In a historic first, the department also claimed that ITRs (ITR-1, ITR-2, ITR-4, ITR-6) were deployed on the e-filing portal on the first day of the financial year i.e; On April 1, 2024. “Out of the 7.28 crore ITRs filed for AY 2024-25, 45.77 per cent of ITRs are ITR-1 (3.34 crore), 14.93 per cent are ITR-2 (1.09 crore), 12.5 per cent are ITR-3 (91.10 lakh), 25.77 per cent are ITR-4 (1.88 crore) and 1.03 per cent are ITR-5 to ITR-7 (7.48 lakh),” it said.
As per the data received by the department, over 43.82 per cent of these ITRs have been filed using the online ITR utility available on the e-filing portal and the remaining have been filed using offline ITR utilities. “During the peak-filing period, the e-filing portal successfully handled huge traffic, providing a seamless experience to taxpayers for filing of ITRs. On July 31, 2024 alone, successful logins stood at 3.2 crore,” it said.
It further said that the process of e-verification is important to commence the processing of ITRs and to issue refunds, if any. “It is encouraging to note that over 6.21 crore ITRs have been e-verified, out of which more than 5.81 crore are through Aadhaar-based OTP (93.56 per cent),” it added.
While expressing its gratitude to tax professionals and taxpayers for their support in compliances in filing of ITRs and forms, the department also said that taxpayers are also requested to verify their unverified ITRs, if any, within 30 days of filing the ITR.
The department also urged taxpayers, who for any reason, missed filing their ITR within the due date, to complete their filing expeditiously. “A lot of emphasis was provided to educate taxpayers about old and new tax regimes. The FAQs and educational videos on the same were designed and uploaded on the e-filing portal,” it said.
