The Chartered Accountants Association, Surat has given an advisory and beta-testing regarding the New Income Tax Portal to the PMO and has recommended them to intervene and simply re-activate the previous IT Portal, so that tax compliances can run on time. Read the official representation letter below:
Ref: CAAS/Representations/2021-22/05
Date: 18-06-2021
To,
The Prime Minister,
152, South Block,
Raisina Hills,
New Delhi - 110011
Sub: Succour for Current Income Tax Portal Turmoil
Respected Pradhan Sevak,
In this hour of a national catastrophe in the form of denial of service by Income Tax Portal, Chartered Accountants Association, Surat, hereby offers its succour to the Government for all possible help, that it can offer for the best intended functioning of the IT infrastructure. We have a great faith in a leader of your stature, equally trust the best intention of our Finance Minister Smt Nirmala Sitharaman and also have greater confidence in the might of the tech companies like Infosys Ltd, who make India proud across the globe.
We are an association with most members working at grassroot levels. Almost all members are well aware with the hardships that stakeholders face while complying with taxation laws. That is why we regularly represent with most critical responses to policy, procedures and portal changes. However, we do not intend to criticize the efforts, capabilities and intentions for betterment of anyone. It is a time to make good what was not desired. A time for joining hands for the betterment of the nation. A time to show outsiders that we stand united. We understand that some goof-ups occur and rightly occur in a lifetime to give us valuable learnings.
Thus, we hereby offer our honorary service in the form of advisory and beta-testing to the Government in co-ordination with whichever agency that may be working for various Tax Departments including Income Tax, GST, ROC, RERA, etc. Recently, FinMin had vide tweet dt.16th June 2021, had invited written representations regarding issues/glitches in the new Income Tax Portal to be sent before 18/06/2021 7pm. In this regards, our recommendation to PMO will be, to intervene and simply re-activate the previous IT Portal, so that tax compliances can run on time. As regards the issues/glitches, the new Income Tax Portal is still under preparation and commenting thereon would be quite pre-mature for any of the stakeholders. Besides, we do not intend to interfere into the development creativity of the database designers, coders and system analysts who want to create something new and user friendly. While, the existing portal is re-activated and made to work, the new agency Infosys Ltd may be given suitable time to provide a good website worthy of its cost, so that its expenditure can be fruitfully enjoyed till the next decade and even beyond. After the website is finally prepared by Infosys, if allowed we may provide a robust testing environment without any cost. We understand that instead of testing a client’s data on a live server, it is better to test dummy data during test phase. Further, we recommend that the existing portal which was running smoothly, be continued during the parallel implementation of new Portal for one full Tax filing season, to ensure timely compliances of all background processes of Income Tax including tax collection.
We hope that above recommendations would be helpful to you in resolving the matter smoothly. Also, since the issues relating to the portal cannot be resolved in a single instance, we urge your goodself to intervene and allow the stakeholders to actively participate in the development process with the developer on an ongoing basis. We look forward to your response on the above.
Thanks & Regards,
For Chartered Accountants Association, Surat.
Original copy of the Representation letter has also been attached below
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