According to the Union Finance Ministry, more than 30.75 lakh audit reports have been submitted for the assessment year 2023-24 by the due date of September 30. Of these, 29.5 lakh tax audit reports have been filed for assessment year 2023-24 and other audit reports in Form No. 29B, 29C, 10CCB etc., says the finance ministry.

According to the ministry, extensive outreach programs have been carried out for the convenience of taxpayers. Around 55.4 lakh contacts were made through emails, SMS and social media including videos as well as informational messages on the income tax portal to alert taxpayers to file the tax audit reports and other audit forms on time.

“The e-filing portal has successfully handled the traffic and provided a seamless experience to the taxpayers and tax professionals in filing the audit reports. This seamless submission experience has been appreciated by professionals across various platforms, including social media,” the ministry says.

“The e-filing helpdesk team has processed around 2.36 lakh September Taxpayer Inquiries will proactively support taxpayers and tax professionals during the filing period and help them resolve any associated complexities. Helpdesk support was provided through inbound calls, outbound calls, live chats, Webex, and co-browsing sessions. The helpdesk team also supported the resolution of queries received through the Ministry’s Twitter account through Online Response Management (ORM), proactively reaching out to taxpayers/stakeholders and providing them with near real-time assistance on various issues. To guide tax professionals, various webinars related to filing of audit forms were conducted,” it added.

According to the Income Tax Department, proper audit for tax purposes would ensure that the books of account and other records are properly maintained, that they truly reflect the taxpayer’s income and that he/she claims deductions correctly.

“Such an audit would also help in checking fraudulent practices. It can also facilitate the administration of tax laws through proper submission of accounts to the tax authorities and significantly save the time of assessing officers in carrying out routine checks such as verifying the accuracy of total amounts and checking whether purchases and sales are properly documented or not. The time that clerks save could be used to handle more important and investigative aspects of a case,” says the IT department.

Notably, the finance ministry had earlier said that more than 3 crore income tax returns were filed for the assessment year 2033-2024.