New ITR forms for A.Y 2018-19 seek more disclosures: Know about all important changes

Posted On 08-04-2018:

The government has notified new Income-Tax Return (ITR) forms for 2018-19. These forms require some additional disclosures from assessees. 

For instance, the assessee had to only mention taxable income from salary and rent from house property in ITR1 and ITR4, respectively, till last year. 

However, in the new forms the assessee has to provide detailed calculation of these incomes. 

There are roughly 27 changes in these ITR forms. 

In accordance with the Finance Act, 2018, ITR7 requires political parties to provide a declaration whether they have received any cash donation in excess of Rs 2,000. 

A political party loses its tax exemption for donations exceeding Rs.2,000, received in cash or any mode other than cheque, draft or digital transfer.

Important changes made in these forms are given in following table:

Previous ITRs	ITRs for A.Y 2018-19
Assessees have to just mention taxable income in ITR1 and income from property in ITR4	Assessees have to provide detail calculation of these incomes
Professionals and small businesses opting for presumptive tax (which does not require maintaining of accounts) are required to provide particulars of total debtors, creditors, total stock-in-trade and cash balance in ITR4	ITR4 seeks more financial details of business such as amount of secured/ unsecured loans, fixed assets, capital account, etc
No requirement of GST number for presumptive tax in ITR4	ITR4 seeks GSTR number of assessees and turnover as filled in GST forms
No requirement for providing GST details in ITR6 for those whose accounts are not audited	ITR6 requires non-audited assessees to provide details of transaction in exempted goods and services from GST, transaction with composite dealers, transaction with registered dealers and total sum paid to them, transaction with unregistered dealers.
No column for GST	ITR3, 5 and 6 introduce new columns to report Central GST, State GST, Integrated GST, UT GST paid and refunds received
Individuals filing ITR2, 3 and 4 required to mention their gender	No requirement of mentioning gender
No requirement for disclosing balance sheet as per Indian Accounting Standards (IND AS)	Those coming under new standards have to disclose balance sheet as per IND-AS in ITR6
No requirement of mentioning income from carbon credits	ITRs 2,3,5,6,7 require disclosure of income earned from carbon credits and tax thereon
No requirement for providing details of ownership of unlisted firms in detail	ITR-6 requires unlisted firms to provide details of all beneficial owners who own at least 10% of voting power directly or indirectly
Taxpayer availing capital gains tax exemptions not required to provide the date of transfer of capital assets	Required to mention date in ITR's 2,3,5 and 6
No column for political parties	ITR7 requires political parties to provide a declaration by selecting ‘Yes’ or ‘No’ check boxes to confirm whether they received any cash donation in excess of Rs 2,000