Gujarat High Court Directs CBDT to Extend ITR Filing Deadline for Audit Cases:

Gujarat High Court Directs CBDT to Extend ITR Filing Deadline for Audit Cases The Gujarat High Court, in an important ruling for both taxpayers and professionals, has directed the Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) to extend the Income Tax Return (ITR) filing due date for Assessment Year (AY) 2025-26. There were several petitions filed by the Income Tax Bar Association and others before the High Court, challenging the CBDT's decision to extend the tax audit filing due date. The CBDT, through its Circular No. 14/2025 dated 25.09.2025, had extended the due date for filing tax audit reports from September 30, 2025, to October 31, 2025. However, it did not issue any circular notifying the extension of the Income Tax Return (ITR) due date for the taxpayers whose accounts were required to be audited.

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The petitioners argued that this violated the Explanation (ii) to Section 44AB of the Income Tax Act, which requires the specified date to be prior to one month from the due date of filing. This means that there must be a one-month gap between the audit report submission and the return filing date. This one-month time gap is provided to allow the prefiling of ITRs if the taxpayers have income from business or profession. The petitioner argued that if the specified date is extended, the due date has to be extended accordingly by one month from the date of extension of the specified date. The Gujarat High Court observed that Circular No. 14/2025 does not align with the provisions of the Act, as just extending the specified due date, without extending the due date for filing the ITR, would go against Explanation (ii) to Section 44AB of the Act and the legislative intention to amend the Finance Act, 2020. As per the data from the last five years, since Assessment Year 2021-22 (when the Finance Act, 2020 came into effect), the gap between the "specified date" and the "due date" has always been at least one month. The court also observed that CBDT is waiting for the end of October 2025 to extend the due date for filing at the last minute, which is not reasonable. The court said that in the present situation, the CBDT ought to have extended the due date as a result of the extension of the specified due date as per Explanation (ii) to Section 44AB of the Act.

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Accordingly, the Gujarat High Court has directed the CBDT to extend the due date of filing returns for the audit cases up to November 30, 2025.