The task force headed by Central Board of Direct Taxes member Akhilesh Ranjan was expected to submit the report on February 28.
A task force on new direct tax legislation has sought two-three months’ extension from the Finance Minister Arun Jaitley today, a senior government official said.
The task force headed by Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) member Akhilesh Ranjan was expected to submit the report on February 28.
The panel, comprising senior income tax department officials, as well as other experts apprised Jaitley on the progress made so far on the direct tax code.
“We have sought direction from the finance minister to draft new legislation,” the official said.
The discussion on reforms pertaining to direct taxes started in September 2017, when the Prime Minister Narendra Modi said that more than half a century old Income Tax Act needs to be re-drafted and a new Direct Tax Code (DTC) needs to be introduced in ‘consonance with economic needs of the country’.
Acting upon it, the finance ministry on November 22, 2017 constituted a task force comprising six members.
Apart from Ranjan, Girish Ahuja, practicing chartered accountant and non-official director, State Bank of India, Rajiv Memani, chairman and regional managing partner of E&Y, Mukesh Patel, practicing tax advocate in Ahmedabad, Mansi Kedia, consultant, ICRIER, and GC Srivastava, retired bureaucrat, are part of the team.
The panel was supposed to submit the draft report on May 22, but sought an extension of three months that got over in August.
However, the former convenor of the task force Arbind Modi, who was also the member of CBDT retired on September 30.
The government then appointed Ranjan as the new head of the panel.
The erstwhile UPA government had finalised the DTC and had introduced the Bill in the Parliament in 2010. However, the Bill lapsed with the dissolution of the 15th Lok Sabha. It aimed at simplifying tax legislation, widening the tax base, while removing a number of exemptions.
The task force is in the process of drafting a direct tax legislation keeping in mind tax system prevalent in various countries, international best practices, economic needs of the country, among others.
Some of the provisions of the DTC such as General Anti-Avoidance Rule (GAAR) and Place of Effective Management (PoEM) has already been implemented.
