Statutory and Regulatory compliance

Relaxation under Direct Taxes

• The last date for filing Income Tax Return for FY 2018-19 (AY 2019-20) has been extended from 31 March 2020 to 30 June 2020.
• Due dates for  issue  of notice, intimation, notification, approval order, sanction order, filing of appeal, filing of statements, applications, reports, any other documents and time limit for completion of proceedings by the authority and any compliance by the taxpayer under the Income Tax Act, Wealth Tax Act, Prohibition of Benami Property Transaction Act, Black Money Act, STT law, CTT Law, Equalization Levy law, Vivad Se Vishwas law, where the time limit is expiring between 20 March 2020 to 29 June 2020 shall be extended to 30 June 2020.
• Reduced interest rate at 9% per annum instead of 12% / 18% per annum (i.e. 0.75% per month instead of 1% / 1.5 % per month) will be charged for delayed payments of advance tax, self-assessment tax, regular tax, TDS, TCS, equalization levy,  STT, CTT made between 20 March 2020 and 30 June 2020. Further, no late fee/penalty would be charged for delay relating to this period. However, deposit timelines are not extended.
• All investments /saving instruments for claiming rebates /deductions /exemptions /investments for roll over benefit of capital gains under Income Tax Act can now be made upto 30 June 2020 instead of 31 March 2020.
• Aadhaar PAN linking date has also been extended from 31 March 2020 to 30 June 2020.
• The timeline for settlement of tax disputes under the Vivad Se Vishwas scheme without any payment of additional charge of 10% has been extended to 30 June 2020  from 31 March 2020.

Relaxation under Indirect Taxes

Goods and Services tax

• For dealers having aggregate annual turnover less than ₹ 5 Crores, last date of filing GSTR-3B due in March, April and May 2020 (i.e returns for supplies made in the months of February, March and April 2020) has been extended till last week of June 2020 in staggered manner (State-Wise specific dates will be notified by CBIC in due course).
• For dealers having aggregate annual turnover of ₹ 5 Crores and above, no late fee & penalty shall be levied where the returns due in March, April and May 2020 (i.e returns for supplies made in the months of February, March and April 2020) are filed till 30 June 2020.
• Interest payments are relaxed for different class of registered persons as mentioned below;

• Due date for opting composition scheme for existing registered persons is extended upto 30 June 2020;
• Date for filing of annual returns for FY 2018-19 due on 31 March 2020 has been extended till 30 June 2020;
• Composition dealers can make the tax payments for the quarter ending 31 March 2020 and file their returns for 2019-20 by last week of June 2020 in staggered manner (State-Wise specific dates will be notified by CBIC in due course).
• Due date for issue of notice, notification, approval order, sanction order, filing of appeal, furnishing of return, statements, applications, reports, any other documents and the time limit for any compliance under the GST laws, where the time limit is expiring between 20 March 2020 to 29 June 2020 shall be extended to 30 June 2020.

Customs

• Customs clearance has been declared as an essential service, which will now be operational 24x7 till 30 June 2020.
• Due date for issue of notice, notification, approval order, sanction order, filing of appeal, furnishing applications, reports, any other documents etc. and the time limit for any compliance under the Customs Act and other allied Laws, where the time limit is expiring between 20 March 2020 to 29 June 2020 shall be extended to 30 June 2020.

Others

• The due date for the payment of liability finalized under “Sabka Vishwas (Legacy Dispute Resolution) Scheme” without the payment of interest has now been extended till 30 June 2020.

Relaxation under Insolvency & Bankruptcy Code

• The existing threshold of default of Rs. 1 lakh under Section 4 of the IBC 2016 has been raised to Rs. 1 crore to prevent triggering of insolvency cases against SMEs/ MSMEs.
• It has been further clarified that in case the present pandemic situation continues beyond 30 April, 2020, then the ministry might consider the suspension of the provisions of Section 7, Section 9 and Section 10 of the IBC 2016 for a period of six months.

Relaxation under Companies Act, 2013

Declaration on Commencement of Business by newly incorporated Companies
Earlier, for newly incorporated companies, a declaration in Form INC-20A had to be filed within six months of their incorporation. Now, there is an additional relaxation of 6 months to make the respective declaration.
 
Resident Director
Earlier, all companies needed to comply with the provision of having atleast one Director resident in India for atleast 182 days in India. A non-compliance under Section 149 of the Act was treated as a violation. Now it won’t be treated as a violation.
 
Deposit Reserve
Earlier, every Company having outstanding public deposits had to invest atleast 20% of the amount of its deposits maturing during the following FY, on or before 30 April of each year and such amount was to be kept in a separate bank account to be called as deposit repayment reserve account. Now, the said date of 30 April has been extended to 30 June 2020.
 
Debenture Redemption Reserve
The current requirement for investing 15% of debentures maturing during a specific year in specified instrument before 30 April 2020 has been extended till 30 June 2020.
 
CARO
The applicability of Companies (Auditor’s Report) Order, 2020 has been extended from FY 2019-20 to FY 2020-21.
 
Holding of Board meetings
The mandatory requirement of holding meetings of the Board of the companies within prescribed interval provided in the Companies Act 2013, ie. 120 days has been extended by a period of 60 days till next two quarters i.e., till 30 September.
  
Meetings of Independent Directors
Earlier, Companies requiring to appoint Independent Directors were mandated to hold atleast one separate meeting of Independent Directors in every FY. Now, this requirement has been waived off for FY 2019-20.
For FY 2019-20, independent directors of company who have not been able to hold even one meeting it won’t be seen as a violation.

Moratorium on all filings at MCA-21 Registry
There shall be a moratorium from 1 April 2020 onwards till 30 September 2020, wherein there shall be levied no additional fees for late filing of any document/return/statement/forms to be filed with registry.