Tax professionals have urged finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman to extend the last date of filing tax audit reports under the provisions of section 44AB till February 28.

They have also pleaded for an extension of the date for filing tax returns for the assessment year 2020-21 in audit cases till March 31.

N.K. Goyal, president of the Direct Taxes Professionals Association (DTPA), said the coronavirus pandemic had wrought havoc with businesses and tax assessees needed more time to grapple with the crisis without being burdened with the compulsions of compliance.

The argument is that the government should cut these assessees some slack in a manner that will not impact tax collections for the fiscal year and ought not to affect the arithmetic for next year’s budget. The dates needed to be extended as many tax professionals had suffered from Covid-19, Goyal added.

Narayan Jain, chairman of the DTPA representation committee, has also urged the government to extend the date for filing declarations under the Vivad Se Vishwas (VSV) scheme from December 31 till February 28. Jain believes that the scheme is still dogged by procedural infirmities. He claims that in many cases, the assessing officers have not been able to give effect to rectification petitions and appeal effects.