The Centre on Monday set September 15 as the deadline for IT major Infosys to resolve all issues related to the income tax filing e-portal so that taxpayers and professionals can work seamlessly on the website. This after Infosys managing director and chief executive officer Salil Parekh, who was summoned by the Centre, met Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman to explain his company’s efforts to sort out the glitches.
According to the ministry of finance, Parekh explained that he and his team are doing everything to ensure the smooth functioning of the portal. “Further, Parekh said that over 750 team members are working on this project and Pravin Rao, COO of Infosys, is personally overseeing this project. Parekh also assured that Infosys is working expeditiously to ensure a glitch-free experience to the taxpayers on the portal,” the ministry said in a statement.
With the new I-T portal remaining unavailable for almost two consecutive days, the Finance Ministry had “summoned” Parekh on Monday to explain to Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman the reasons for continued glitches even after over two months of launch.The Income Tax department said that the portal itself has become unavailable since August 21.
At the meeting, Sitharaman has expressed annoyance and concerns of the government and the taxpayers about the continuing glitches in the e-filing portal of the Income Tax Department even after two and half months since its launch, which was also delayed. Sitharaman sought an explanation from Infosys for the repeated issues faced by taxpayers.
The ministry emphasised that there is a need for putting in more resources and efforts on the part of Infosys so that the much delayed delivery of agreed services is ensured. Mr. Parekh was also sensitised on the difficulties that the taxpayers were facing and the problems that are arising on account of the delays in the functioning of the portal.
The Finance Minister also made it clear that the issues faced by taxpayers on current functionalities of the portal should be resolved by the team by 15th September, 2021 so that taxpayers and professionals can work seamlessly on the portal.
Meanwhile, the company in a late-evening tweet said emergency maintenance of the portal has concluded and the site is live.
The new income tax e-filing portal “www.incometax. gov.in’, developed by Infosys, had a bumpy start from the day of its launch on June 7, as it continued to face tech glitches with users complaining that certain functionalities were either unavailable or working slow.