On August 13, 2020, Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched a platform for “Transparent Taxation – Honoring the Honest” via video conferencing that provides faceless assessment and appeal and taxpayers’ charter, as a part of direct tax reforms.
- The objective of the platform is to ease the tax compliance and expediting refunds, benefiting honest taxpayers.
- While the faceless assessment and taxpayers’ charter would be implemented from August 13 itself but the faceless appeal system would be available from September 25, 2020 i.e. on the birth anniversary of Deendayal Upadhyaya.
Participants: Union Minister of Finance and Corporate Affairs, Shrimati Nirmala Sitharaman and Minister of State for Finance and Corporate Affairs, Shri Anurag Singh Thakur were also present on the occasion. The event was witnessed by various Chambers of Commerce, Trade Associations, Chartered Accountants’ associations and also eminent taxpayers, apart from the officers and officials of the Income Tax (IT) Department.
Efforts by CBDT in Tax Reforms:
The focus of the tax reforms has been on reduction in tax rates and on simplification of direct tax laws. In this regard, the Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) has carried out several major tax reforms in direct taxes in the recent years including:
- Reduction in Corporate Tax rates from 30% to 22% and for new manufacturing units the rates were reduced to 15%. Dividend distribution Tax was also abolished.
- With a view to provide for resolution of pending tax disputes the Direct Tax “Vivad se Vishwas Act, 2020” was rolled out.
- Document Identification Number (DIN) wherein every communication of the Department would carry a computer generated unique document identification number.
- To increase the ease of compliance for taxpayers, IT Department has moved forward with prefilling of income tax returns.
Owing to continuous reforms, on the ease-of-doing-business front, India’s ranking had improved from 134th to 63rd position in 2019.
Recent Related News:
CBDT and Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) for the data exchange between the two organisations.
About Central Board of Direct Taxes:
Chairperson– Pramod Chandra Mody
