Gone are the days when private entities were notorious of deducting income tax at source from employees and not depositing the amount with income tax department. If Income Tax Department figures are to be believed, Government departments and Public Sector Undertakings (PSUs) are taking pole position in non-compliance of Tax Deducted at Source (TDS)/Tax Collected at Source (TCS) norms in Jharkhand.
Principal Chief Income Tax Commissioner (Bihar-Jharkhand Circle) Kailash Chandra Ghumaria said on the sidelines of an awareness seminar on the subject organised in CMPDI premises on Friday that around 46 Government departments and PSUs were declared defaulter at filing TDS/TCS in Jharkhand during last financial year and it was not a good sign.
“Those who are bound to get rules followed can’t be allowed to break it. Income Tax collection from Bihar-Jharkhand Circle is estimated at Rs 13,200 Crores in which TDS/TCS share rests at Rs 8,500 Crores. So, if companies are compliant at reporting their TDS/TCS timely, it only means that the income tax department officials assigned to verify the data or enforce proper filing of TDS are not doing their job properly.
We found 46 government offices and PSUs not complying with TDS/TCS norms and we shall take legal action against all of them if required,” said Ghumaria.
The seminar was organised to spread awareness among employees and employers and tax officials about tax deduction, tax depositing, tax returns and issues related to it. Principal Income Tax Commissioners from Ranchi, Jamshedpur and Dhanbad R Bala Naik, Avinash Kumar Sahay and Lalit Mohan Pandey respectively, Income Tax Commissioner TDS (Bihar-Jharkhand) RB Mishra, Joint Income Tax Commissioners PK Mandal, Sanjay Mallik and AK Mohanty Deputy Income Tax Commissioner (Administration) Nisha Oraon Singhmar, CMPDI CMD S Sharan and dozens of tax officials and lawyers were present in the seminar.
“The department is ready to take on Chartered Accountants who helped builders, jewelers and businessmen in getting their black money white during demonetization, as this fraudulent acts tried to blunt impact of the very idea of demonetization.
I want to tell government departments that they have no distinct edge over private companies as far as filing income tax returns is concerned, and income tax officials in region are ready to hit all of them hard equally,” said Ghumaria.