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The Income-tax department has collected around Rs 28 crore in taxes after about 1 lakh returns were filed by taxpayers under the newly introduced return filing form called ITR-U, that was notified this year as part of the Budget 2022-23.

CBDT Chairman Nitin Gupta has said that the scheme was brought by the Union government for the benefit of taxpayers so that they can comply with their tax responsibilities without getting into hassles of the law. The abbreviation ITR-U stands for 'income tax return-updated' and is available to taxpayers for filing updated returns for 2019-20 and 2020-21 financial years or assessment years 2020-21 and 2021-22. Taxpayers filing this form, which can be filed within 2 years of the end of the relevant assessment year, will have to give reasons for updating the income -- return previously not filed or income not reported correctly or wrong heads of income chosen or reduction of carried forward loss.

Gupta further said such schemes could also be utilised by those categories of taxpayers who have income from online games, lotteries and betting etc. This is a provision for them to come forward and pay taxes rather than face the consequences of penalty or any other legal action under the income tax law. The department is looking at all such businesses including online betting and gaming and cited the example of raids conducted by the taxman against a Mumbai-based group engaged in online cricket betting and gaming in February. The CBDT had then said in a statement that the tax department detected a ‘cash’ turnover of Rs 600 crore that was made by the company in six months.