ABSTRACT

                             Income tax is a key source of funds that any government uses to finance its activities and serve the public. It has been aptly said that taxes are the price we pay for civilization. The tax system of a country, thus, reflects the social, economic and political aims of the Government. The tax administration is  revamped to treat taxpayers as customers .The Income Tax Department of the Ministry of Finance, Government of India, is committed to provide world – class services to taxpayers in the country, making tax compliance easy and convenient. One of the initiatives of the Income Tax Department was the introduction of Electronic filing (e-filing) of income tax returns (ITRs) to make the filing process easier for taxpayers as well as to reduce the time required for data entry on receipt of returns. Enabling the filing of ITRs over the Internet was the most viable answer to the department’s needs. While the facility would be beneficial to the taxpayers, the department had to create an environment wherein the user would feel secure about filing his ITRs online. E - Filing helped furnishing ITRs through authorized intermediaries who were called “e-Return Intermediaries”. Response time for processing the ITRs as well as claiming refund dropped significantly. Duplication of efforts was eliminated since data entered by intermediaries was already available in the system for any time use and reference. This paper has highlighted the  awareness level of individual tax payers towards e-delivery services through computerization initiatives, the level of awareness among the tax payers towards e-governance initiatives of the government and the acceptance level towards various aspects of E-filing of Income tax returns.

Key words: E-filing, ITRs, TARC, E-Governance, awareness.