Out of the seven ITR Forms, only three Forms – ITR-1, ITR-2 and ITR-4 – have been uploaded for filing the return of income for the AY 2020-21 online, while other are available offline only.

The Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) had notified on May 29, 2020 all the seven Income Tax Return (ITR) Forms for the Assessment Year (AY) 2020-21 and has also issued the ITR Forms to allow the assessees to file their return on the basis of income earned in the Financial Year (FY) 2019-20.

The seven ITR Forms notified by the CBDT are –

ITR-2: To be used by individuals and Hindu Undivided Families (HUFs) not carrying out business or profession under any proprietorship.

ITR-3: To be used by individuals and HUFs having income from a proprietary business or profession.

ITR-4 (Sugam): To be used by presumptive income from business and profession.

ITR-5: To be used by persons other than,- (i) individual, (ii) HUF, (iii) company and (iv) person filing Form ITR-7.

ITR-6: To be used by companies other than companies claiming exemption under section 11.

ITR-7: To be used by persons (including companies) required to furnish return under sections 139(4A) or 139(4B) or 139(4C) or 139(4D) or 139(4E) or 139(4F).

However, out of the seven ITR Forms, only three Forms – ITR-1, ITR-2 and ITR-4 – have been uploaded for filing the return of income for the AY 2020-21 online, while other Forms are available offline only.

While the assessees, whose accounts are not required to be audited, need to file their return of income on or before the due date of July 31 every Assessment Year, this year filings have been delayed due to the COVID-19 lockdown.

As a result, only three ITR Forms are now available for online filing of return of income and other forms may only be filed offline.

However, an assessee is allowed to file the ITR offline only if the assessee is an individual with age of 80 years or more or an individual/HUF having annual income up to Rs 5 lakh and no tax refund is claimed by the assessee in the ITR.

So, in case you fulfill the above conditions, you may file your return of income either online or offline.

However, unavailability of Form 16, and Form 16A, due to extension in deadline, makes it difficult for assessees to file their return of income even online as updated Form 26AS is also not available due to lack of inputs regarding income from salary and other sources and tax deducted at source from those incomes.