FM Sitharaman gives Infosys September 15 deadline to fix I-T portal snags

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Monday asked IT services provider Infosys to fix persistent technical issues in the new tax filing portal by September 15 ahead of the tax returns deadline.

The company was also nudged to ramp up resources to ensure services to millions of taxpayers. Sitharaman summoned Salil Parekh, managing director and chief executive of Infosys, at her office seeking explanation over the company’s inability to resolve the snags in the portal even after two-and-a-half-months since its launch.

Within hours of its launch on June 7, complaints had started coming in with users saying they were facing issues such as inability to generate OTP for Aadhaar validation, generate password, link old data for past returns, etc.

The summon to Parekh was triggered by inaccessibility of the portal during the weekend due to some maintenance activities.

Sources say the government has also asked Infosys to rework or make some modifications in the back-end of the portal, which is creating issues in data migration and integration. While conveying its disappointment and concerns, the ministry emphasised that there was 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, according to the media release issued by the Central Board of Direct taxes. It said Infosys was also sensitised on the difficulties that the taxpayers were facing and the problems that were arising on account of the delays in the functioning of the portal.

The government had extended the due date for filing tax returns for assessment year 2021-22 to September 30 amid the pandemic. However, if the glitches persist, it may consider further extension of the tax filing. During the meeting, Parekh explained that Infosys was doing everything to ensure the smooth functioning of the portal. 

He said over 750 team members were working on this project and Chief Operating Officer Pravin Rao was overseeing this project. Infosys was in 2019 awarded a contract to develop the new portal to reduce processing time for returns from 63 days to one day and expedite refunds.