If you miss belated ITR filing date, be ready to pay Rs 10,000 penalty. Here’s how to file

New Delhi: The last date to file the income tax return (ITR) for the financial year 2018-19 was August 31. In case you missed to file your ITR by this date, you have time to file it till December 31. If you miss this deadline, too, then you will attract a heft penalty.

Budget 2017 introduced a law of levying late filing fees under Section 234F of Income-Tax Act, 1961, which became effective from FY18 or assessment year 2018-19 onwards. If individual files belated ITR on or before December 2019, he or she will require to pay Rs 5,000 as penalty while filing it after December 31, 2019, but before or on March 31, 2020, will make you pay Rs 10,000 as fine.

If your income is below the taxable limit, then you don’t have to pay a late filing fee. But if your gross total income doesn’t exceed Rs 5 lakh, then the maximum fees you are liable to pay is Rs 1,000.

How to file a belated return-

The process of filing a belated return is the same as filing the return on or before the due date. The only difference is that while filing the applicable ITR form, you will need to select ‘Return filed under Section 139(4)’ in the drop-down menu in the relevant box in the form. It may be noted that while filing a belated return for FY16-17, you need to fill the applicable ITRs as notified for FY16-17 only (not for any previous or later financial year).

Disadvantages of filing a belated return-

You cannot carry forward losses (except loss from house property). It may be noted that the losses under the following heads of income- income from business and profession including speculation business, capital gains and income from other sources cannot be carried forward in case of filing a belated return.

If you have any unpaid tax liability, then penal interest would be levied, as applicable to your case, if you file a belated return. However, if no tax is payable, the taxpayer will not be allowed to pay his interest.

It may be noted that the tax department processed as many as 2.10 crore tax refund cases, returning back over Rs 1.46 lakh crore in first eight months of 2019-20, up 20 per cent over the last year as a centralized processing centre (CPC) has expedited the process, officials said. CPC had processed 4.70 crore tax returns between April 2019 and November 28 as opposed to 3.91 crore returns being processed in the same period a year back, they said.