Income tax return filing: Mismatch in ITR-I and Form 16/16A details? Fear call from taxman? Read this, here is truth

The I-T Department has recently made an amendment that notices will not be sent to tax payers basis the mismatch of details in ITR 1 and Form 16/16A.

In case someone has already received an I-T notice as per the earlier law, then he need not worry since his return would be processed under the new law.

By this time you must have filed your income tax return for the Financial Year 2016-17 and might be relaxing as well, particularly if there was no mismatch in the details of Income Tax Return and Form 16/16A/26AS. However, in case there was any mismatch of income mentioned in Form ITR-I and as per Form 16/16A/26AS, then a notice from the Income Tax Department was certain. In fact, lots of taxpayers have already received notices under Section 143(1) to justify the reasons for such a mismatch. However, if that was the case with you too and you were also expecting a notice from the I-T Department, then there is no need to worry now as the I-T Department has recently made an amendment that notices will not be sent to tax payers basis the mismatch of details in ITR 1 and Form 16/16A/26AS.
Talking about this, Chetan Chandak, Head of Tax Research, H&R Block India, says, “This year many taxpayers faced a tough time responding to notices from the Income Tax Department. These notices were issued under Section 143(1)(a) of the IT Act and were mainly sent because there was a mismatch in the details of income and exemptions claimed by individuals in their ITR 1 and the details as available in their Form 16 / 16A / Form 26AS. This was because the I-T Department had simplified the basic ITR 1 form (into a simple one page form) without any need to give details for many heads of income and exemptions. Hence, when the assessing officer compared the ITR 1 filed with the Form 16/16A/26AS, it resulted in the mismatch of records, resulting in notices being sent to people.”
These comparisons were obviously incorrect and hence the I-T Department has now made an amendment that notices will not be sent to tax payers basis the mismatch of details in ITR 1 and Form 16/16A/26AS. However, if a certain head of income as mentioned in any of these three forms is altogether excluded in Form ITR 1, then a notice will still be sent basis such a mismatch. For example, if a certain interest income reflects in your Form 16A and 26AS and this has not been mentioned in Form ITR 1, then the taxpayer may still receive a notice from the I-T Department under Section 143(1)(a).
However, “in case someone has already received a notice as per the earlier law, then he need not worry since his return would be processed under the new law. This holds good even if he hasn’t responded to the notice. In case he has filed a revised return in response to such a notice, even then his return will be processed according to the new law,” informs Chandak.