If you have income over and above your salary, it will be a wise decision this time to mention it when filing your returns with the Income-Tax Department.
After years of trying, the department seems to have got it right this time round and is in a position to track a lot of income, especially those earned from moonlighting.
And how does it do that? Before this year is out, more than 4 crore (40 million) Indians will sport a PAN, which means that the department can track almost any income flow in the country on their upcoming computerised tax information network.
So take just that bit of extra time to fill up the income tax returns, which is mandatory for anybody with an annual income above Rs 50,000.
The last date has been extended to September 30 this year, for salaried people for whom the procedure remains basically the same.
Along with Form 16, which is supplied by one's employer as proof of tax deduction at source, the taxpayer has to fill up the Naya Saral form, which has been made very simple.
It is also known as form No 2D. Assessees can also file their returns on form No 3, and this too is not much of a hassle, since most of the "other than salary income" slots can be just ignored.
But it is better to write non-applicable rather than leave them blank, or it might be classified as incomplete returns.
And non-filing of returns on time carries a penal interest of 12 per cent. The Naya Saral form can also be used by assessees who run small businesses.
But for the few million other non-salaried people, which includes the retired, the relevant form is No 2C.
The last date for them this year is October 31.
This economic category includes six criteria like owning or leasing a car, staying in a house as owner or tenant that looks big enough to the revenue department, going abroad except to SAARC countries (not Maldives -- you fly there), having a mobile but not WLL, a credit card or a club membership.
Ishita Sengupta, a chartered accountant, said instead of rushing to consultants to evade tax, it is much more productive to plan genuine tax shelters as the income tax department has become far more adept at tracking the former.
She also said since quoting PAN has become mandatory for almost any high value transactions including buying motor vehicles, it makes sense for the huge number of double income homes in middle class to take some time to calculate their tax liability.
In the rush of the last date for filing returns, one ends up making too many unproductive savings.
Instead she said, you can take advantage of the deduction for expenditure for school fees, while the exemption for interest income on loans for self-occupied houses is also a robust tax shelter.
Besides it is not enough to simply attach form 16 as proof of savings, especially under Section 88 of the Income Tax Act, and one must attach the copies of certificates.