The Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) has advised the taxpayers to review their foreign income and assets once before submitting ITR. Actually, there was a lot of confusion about this. To end this confusion among the taxpayers, the Income Tax Department gave information about the rules of foreign income and assets to the taxpayers in its special edition communication.
The Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) has advised all taxpayers to review their foreign income and assets before filing their In-Tax Return (ITR) and then fill the information on that basis.
This advice was given to the taxpayers in the special edition of Income Tax Department ‘Samvad’. This campaign has been started to make taxpayers aware. According to this campaign, taxpayers should give information about foreign income and assets in ITR only after carefully reviewing them.
During the session, CBDT Commissioner (Investigation) Shashi Bhushan Shukla said that all Indian citizens have to give information about foreign assets including bank accounts, real estate, shares, insurance policies which they own.
Further, he said that the Income Tax Department has given a step-by-step guide in the ITR form “Foreign Assets and Income”. With the help of this guide, one can give information about foreign income and property. He emphasized that this rule applies to resident taxpayers.
Information about this is given in Section 6 of the Income Tax Act. Shukla clarified that according to the rules, a resident taxpayer is one who has stayed in India for at least 182 days during the previous year or who has stayed in India for 365 days during the last four years. If a taxpayer does not fulfill these criteria, he will be considered a non-resident. Non-residents do not need to declare foreign income and property.
Confusion cleared
Many times, taxpayers who do not have any foreign income or property, still give information about it in ITR. In order to end the confusion, Shukla clarified completely which taxpayers have to give information about foreign property and income. He also told that if a taxpayer has bought a property abroad and is not getting any income from it, then also information about that property should be given in ITR.
If an NRI comes to India and gets Indian citizenship, then he will also have to give information about his foreign property and income. This rule also applies to those foreign citizens when they become citizens of India.
