Infosys' deadline to fix the income tax portal ends today

The clock is ticking for Infosys to fix the glitches in India's electronic tax filing portal.

The finance ministry summoned Salil Parekh, the chief executive officer of Asia’s second-largest software service provider, in August asking him to explain why glitches in the nation’s new electronic tax filing portal have not yet been fixed.

Infosys had time till today to get the system right.


Since the portal went live on June 8, taxpayers have faced technical glitches, errors and challenges in accessing the portal or several functions within the website, drawing their ire as well as that of the finance ministry.

Even though the government extended the ITR filing deadline for individual taxpayers till December 31, a 1% interest is being levied for each month of delay beyond the original July 31 deadline, prompting questions about the North Block penalising taxpayers for administrative failures.

The finance minister and officials from the Department of Revenue had a detailed interaction with the company’s top brass to resolve the matter earlier as well. The meeting, which included tax practitioners, highlighted several glitches with regard to services on the e-filing portal’s 2.0 version.

In January 2019, Infosys emerged as the lowest bidder for the Rs 4,242 crore contract for the integrated e-filing and central processing centre project, to be deployed and managed for about nine years. So far, the government has paid Infosys Rs 164.5 crore for the project, minister of state for finance Pankaj Chaudhary told Parliament in July.