The effectiveness of the government’s voluntary compliance program was shown by the more than nine million revised Income-Tax Returns (ITRs) that were submitted during the previous four years, which helped the government generate an extra Rs9,118 crore in revenue, Parliament was told.

As part of a program to promote voluntary compliance, the government in 2022 offered taxpayers the opportunity to submit updated I-T returns (ITR-U) up to two years from the relevant assessment year (AY) by paying extra income tax.

Over 9.176 million ITR-Us were submitted between AY 2021–2022 and AY 2024–2025, bringing in an extra Rs9,118 crore for the government, according to a written response in the Lok Sabha from Minister of State for Finance Pankaj Chaudhary. According to the minister, about 464,000 amended ITRs have been submitted and Rs 431.20 crore in taxes have been paid as of February 28 of the current assessment year (2024–25).

The government has proposed to extend the deadline for submitting revised returns to a maximum of four years from the relevant assessment year via the Finance Bill, 2025. Given the scheme’s success, the action has been taken.

Over 2.979 million ITR-Us were submitted and Rs2,947 crore in extra taxes were paid in the fiscal year 2023–2024. 4.007 million and 1.724 million updated ITRs were submitted in AY 2022–23 and AY 2021–22, respectively, and Rs3,940 crore and Rs1,799.76 crore in taxes were paid. In response to another query, the minister said that the “Incentive Scheme for Promotion of Low-Value BHIM-UPI Transactions (Person to Merchant – P2M)” for the fiscal year 2024–2025 had been authorized by the Union Cabinet.