New Delhi- The income tax department, on Tuesday, said a record 6.77 crore income tax returns for the assessment year 2023-24 were filed till July 31, including 53.67 lakh first-time filers.
“The total number of ITRs for AY 2023-24 filed till 31st July 2023 are more than 6.77 crore, which is 16.1 per cent more than the total ITRs for AY 2022-23 (5.83 crore) filed till 31st July 2022,” the income tax department said in a statement.
July 31 was the last date for filing income tax returns by salaried taxpayers and those who do not need to get their accounts audited for income earned in the 2022-23 fiscal.
The filing of ITRs peaked on July 31, 2023, (the due date for salaried taxpayers and other non-tax audit cases), with over 64.33 lakh ITRs being filed on a single day.
The department also received 53.67 lakh ITRs till July 31, 2023, from first-time filers, a fair indication of the widening of the tax base, the department added.
Of the 6.77 crore ITRs, 5.63 crore returns have been e-verified, out of which more than 5.27 crore are through Aadhaar-based OTP (94 per cent).
Of the e-verified ITRs, more than 3.44 crore ITRs for AY 2023-24 have been processed (61 per cent) by July 31.
The e-filing helpdesk team handled approximately 5 lakh queries from taxpayers in July. The support from the helpdesk was provided to taxpayers through inbound calls, outbound calls, live chats, Webex and co-browsing sessions, the department said.
Out of the 6.77 crore ITRs filed for AY 2023-24, 49.18 per cent are ITR-1 (3.33 crore), 11.97 per cent are ITR-2 (81.12 lakh), 11.13 per cent are ITR-3 (75.40 lakh), 26.77 per cent are ITR-4 (1.81 crore) and 0.94 per cent are ITR-5 to 7 (6.40 lakh).
Over 46 per cent of these ITRs have been filed using the online ITR utility available on the e-filing portal, and the balance has been filed using offline ITR utilities. (PTI)