No deadline extension for filing GSTR-3B after December: Government

The government on Saturday ruled out any further extension of timeline after December for filing GSTR-3B tax returns by businesses.

GSTR 3B is a simple return form introduced by the CBEC for the month of July and August, following the roll out of the Goods and Services Tax from July 1.

"We have already extended the period for GSTR-3B...People have to file their own self-assessed summary return till December, and there will not be any extension of time as far as GSTR-3B is concerned", Revenue Secretary Hasmukh Adhia said.

Adhia was speaking to reporters here after the first meeting of the Group of Ministers (GOM) formed to tackle the IT-related glitches in GST network.

He was asked whether the government intends to further extend time for filing returns under GST.

The GST Council had earlier allowed businesses to file GSTR-3B till December.

Adhia said the government had earlier decided to extend the time limit to have a proper learning period due to GSTN portal hiccups.

"It decided to extend the timeline of filing GSTR-1, from September 10 to October 10. The last dates of filing returns for GSTR-2 and GSTR-3 are October 31 and November 10, respectively", he added.

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Bihar Deputy Chief Minister Sushil Kumar Modi, who heads the GoM, said it would be only by October 30 that the government would be able to iron out 70-80 per cent of the technical issues being faced by stakeholders in return filing.

To a query, Adhia said the meeting was very fruitful because it led to a better understanding among all stakeholders.

"Any new system will be afflicted with some initial hiccups, but the attempt today was to work around difficulties faced by stakeholders in filing returns on GSTN platform", he said.

Sushil Kumar Modi said only 3.3 lakh people had filed their GSTR-3B in August, while there are 85 lakh dealers registered under the new tax regime.

"Further, even for the previous month of July, only 46 lakh taxpayers have filed their 3B returns so far", Modi said.

India's GSTN is the biggest in the world with minimal human interface, he said, adding that as of now, 22 crore of invoices have been filed which shows the robustness of GST regime.

Modi also said that as many as 23.18 lakh new dealers have been registered, and another 11 lakh dealers were under 'composition scheme'.

GSTN, portal for real-time taxpayer registration, migration, and tax return filing under GST, faced problems, forcing government to extend the last date of filing returns.

Modi appealed to taxpayers not to wait for the last date to file returns.

He said the GoM would meet once every 15 days.

Asked if software major Infosys, the service provider, will be penalised for the glitches the stakeholders are facing, Adhia said the company has not failed and it is "the media presumption".

"There are always initial hicupps and issues, but there haven't been large-scale failures", he said.

Kerala Finance minister Thomas Isaac, Chhattisgarh minister of Commercial Taxes Amar Agrawal, Karnataka Agriculture minister Krishna Byre Gowda and Telangana Finance minister Etela Rajender are other members of the GoM.

Adhia, GSTN Chairman Ajay Bhushan Pandey and GSTN CEO Prakash Kumar also attended meeting.

GST was adopted to make it easier for businesses to move goods from one state to another, which was not the case under the earlier central and state tax regimes.

However, GSTN, the system supposed to handle the filing of returns, suffered glitches due to the rush of filing invoices as the deadline approached.