More than a crore of rupees as Agricultural Income - IT Scanner on
INCOME Tax Department has noticed that several assessees have declared income from agriculture of more than Rs.1 Crore in the income tax return filed for earlier years especially from AY 2011-12 to 2013-14.
There is a PIL matter pending before the Patna High Court wherein concerns have been raised that a few assesses may be engaged in routing their unaccounted / illegal money in the garb of agricultural income thereby not only claiming exemptions on such income but also engaged in the money laundering activities.
While most of the real farmers hardly get any income, there are several rich people who have cultivated agriculture to reap rich harvest by converting their black money into non-taxable white money by declaring it as agricultural income.
The Directorate of Systems wants the Assessing Officers to
(i) Verify whether the taxpayer may have made a data entry error while filling up the return.
(ii) Wherever scrutiny assessment is completed, AO may provide feedback based on assessment records.
(iii) In cases where proceedings u/s 143(3) are pending, assessing officers may be informed to thoroughly verify the claims.