Admitted income tax is the balance you still owe on your income for the year after every credit and prepayment is subtracted from your total tax liability. Section 140A of the Income Tax Act, 1961 requires you to pay that balance, along with any interest and late fee, before you file your return, and to attach proof of payment when you file.1Income Tax Department. Income Tax Act 1961 – Section 140A If the calculation comes out to zero or a refund, you have no admitted tax to pay.
What Counts as Admitted Income Tax
The admitted figure is not your gross tax bill. It is the positive amount left after Section 140A(1) lets you subtract six categories of credits and prepayments from your computed liability:
- Advance tax and any other payments already made during the year under the Act.
- TDS deducted by employers, banks, or other payers, and TCS collected on specified transactions.
- Relief under Section 89 for salary arrears or other lump-sum payments relating to earlier years.
- Double taxation relief under Sections 90 and 91 for taxes paid to a foreign country.
- Relief under Section 90A for taxes paid in a specified territory under agreements between specified associations.
- MAT or AMT credit carried forward under Sections 115JAA and 115JD.
Whatever remains after those subtractions is your admitted tax.1Income Tax Department. Income Tax Act 1961 – Section 140A A zero or negative result means you owe nothing under self-assessment and may be in refund territory.
Interest and Late Fees You Also Owe
Section 140A does not stop at the raw tax shortfall. You have to clear applicable interest before filing too. Three provisions come up most often:
- Section 234A charges 1% per month, or part of a month, on unpaid tax when you file after the due date, running from the deadline to the actual filing date.
- Section 234B charges 1% per month on the shortfall when your advance tax payments came in below 90% of the assessed tax.
- Section 234C charges the same 1% monthly rate on each quarterly advance tax installment you missed or underpaid, even if your annual total eventually caught up.
A late filing fee under Section 234F applies on top of interest if you miss the original return deadline. It’s ₹1,000 when your total income is ₹5 lakh or less, and ₹5,000 when it exceeds ₹5 lakh.2Income Tax Department. Income Tax Act 1961 – Section 140A Interest and the late fee both have to be paid alongside the tax balance for your return to count as validly filed.
Check Your Credits Before You Calculate
Getting the admitted figure right depends on confirming every credit you’re claiming. Form 26AS, available through the Income Tax e-Filing portal, is the consolidated statement that shows your TDS, TCS entries, advance tax and self-assessment tax already deposited, refunds received during the year, and specified financial transactions.3Income Tax Department. View Tax Credit Mismatch FAQs
Form 16 from your employer breaks down salary income and TDS on it. Form 16A from banks or other deductors covers non-salary TDS. Reconcile these against Form 26AS before you compute your balance. A gap between what a deductor reported and what appears in your 26AS is a common source of errors, and it can either inflate your admitted tax or trigger a mismatch notice after you file.
If you’re claiming foreign tax credits or relief under Sections 89, 90, 90A, or 91, keep the underlying documents ready. The relief cuts your admitted tax directly, but you carry the burden of proof if the department questions it later.
How to Pay
The e-Filing portal handles the payment end-to-end. Under the e-Pay Tax service, you generate a challan online, receive a unique Challan Reference Number (CRN), and pay through net banking, debit card, RTGS/NEFT, UPI, or a payment gateway that accepts credit cards.4Income Tax Department. e-Pay Tax
Pick the right payment type when you create the challan. Self-assessment tax uses code (300) on Challan ITNS 280.5Protean Technologies. OLTAS FAQs – Tax Information Network The wrong code sends your money to the wrong ledger and creates reconciliation problems that hold up return processing. ITNS 280 is the challan designated for income tax, separate from the forms used for other direct taxes.6Income Tax Department. Challan Creation through PAN Login
Paying at a bank counter is still an option for most individual taxpayers. Companies and individuals subject to mandatory audit have to pay online. Save the receipt and the CRN once the payment goes through. You’ll need them for your return.
Attaching Proof When You File
A return filed without paying the admitted tax is not treated as a valid return. Section 140A requires the return to be accompanied by proof that the tax and interest were paid.1Income Tax Department. Income Tax Act 1961 – Section 140A In practice, you enter your challan details into the designated fields of your ITR: the CRN, or for older payments the BSR code (identifying the bank branch) and Challan Serial Number.
The portal cross-references these against its payment records. Missing, mismatched, or unrecorded payment details can get your return flagged as defective or rejected. A defective return doesn’t count as filed until it’s corrected, which can push you past the deadline and start Section 234A interest running.
What Happens If You Don’t Pay
Skipping or underpaying admitted tax does more than delay your filing. Section 140A(3) treats you as an “assessee in default” for any portion of admitted tax, interest, or fee left unpaid.7Income Tax Department. Income Tax Act 1961 – Section 140A That status opens the door to the Act’s recovery provisions.
Under Section 221, the Assessing Officer can impose a penalty on a taxpayer in default. The penalty can be increased for a continuing default, but the total cannot exceed the tax in arrears, and the officer has to give you a reasonable chance to explain the non-payment first.8Income Tax Department. Income Tax Act 1961 – Section 221 At the extreme, you could end up owing close to double: the arrears plus a penalty equal to them.
Default status also lets the department pursue coercive recovery, attach bank accounts, or set future refunds off against the outstanding balance. If you can’t pay the full admitted amount, paying whatever you can before filing still helps, because interest and penalties compound only on the unpaid portion.