ITR Filing AY2025-26: With almost a two-month delay, the Income Tax Department has made available two Excel-based offline utilities for ITR-1 and ITR-4, which are applicable basically to individual taxpayers with less than Rs 50 lakh annual income. Ideally, taxpayers need an ITR form applicable to them based on their income status and a corresponding Excel-based utility to file their income tax returns. These forms and utilities were supposed to be made available by the Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) at the very beginning of the financial year but this year first the notification of forms was delayed by almost one month and then it took the government another one month to start releasing the online utilities to file tax returns.
With utilities available, can taxpayers start filing ITR for AY 2025-26 now?
ITR-1 (Sahaj) and ITR-4 (Sugam) offline Excel utilities have been enabled by the Income Tax Department.
“As of May 30, 2025, the Income Tax Department has released the Excel-based offline utilities for ITR-1 (Sahaj) and ITR-4 (Sugam) for Assessment Year (AY) 2025–26. These utilities allow taxpayers to prepare their returns offline by entering income details, validating the information, and generating a JSON file for submission,” says CA (Dr.) Suresh Surana.
However, the e-filing portal has not been enabled for taxpayers to submit returns via online interface, he added.
Also read: Income Tax Rules: How to claim pre-construction interest on housing loan in ITR filing AY 2025-26
The delay in furnishing of returns may be due to the following:
-Pending Release of E-Filing Utilities: The necessary online utilities for submitting returns (apart from ITR-1 and ITR-4) are still not released.
-Awaiting TDS Certificates: Employers are required to issue Form 16 by June 15, 2025. Filing returns without this document may lead to discrepancies.
-Updating of Financial Statements: The Statement of Financial Transactions (SFT), which provides a consolidated view of TDS credits, advance tax, and high-value transactions are typically updated with Q4 data in the second week of June. Filing before this update may result in incomplete information.
In light of these factors, Surana says, taxpayers need to wait until after 15 June, 2025, to file their returns. This ensures that all necessary documents and system updates are in place, facilitating a smoother and more accurate filing process,
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