Deduction up to Rs15,000 allowed on family pension

S C Vasudeva

Kindly clarify if there is any standard deduction on family pension amount which a person gets during a financial year. If so, please mention the relevant section of the Income-tax Act, 1961.I am a pensioner of PSU and submitting ITR-I (for salaried persons) every year. Under which item/column, the amount of family pension has to be mentioned and is it necessary to attach the income certificates of both the pensions, even though there is no rule to attach any documents with the return. —Surinder Singh

Yes, in case of family pension, a standard deduction to the extent of 1/3rd of the family pension or Rs 15,000, whichever of the two is lower is allowable.

The deduction is allowable under Section 57(iia) of the Income-tax Act, 1961 (The Act).

a) Family pension is to be shown under the head “income from other sources” in the Income-tax Return.

b) No attachments are allowed along with the return as per the new rules.

Can conveyance deeds issued in 1963/1964 by the Rehabilitation Department (custodian), powered by the President of India be set aside or rejected by authorities in any manner after 50 years? — KB Lal

A Tehsildar has no authority to reject or set aside the conveyance deed executed by the Rehabilitation Department of the Central Government of India. Such a conveyance deed must have been executed under the name of the President of India. Therefore, a Tehsildar who is also a Government employee, should have no authority to question a document in the nature of a conveyance deed executed under the authority of the Government of India.

I am a senior citizen aged 82 years and pensioner. Besides pension, I have income from interest on bank’s fixed deposits, Post Office monthly income scheme, rental income from house property, etc. I am regularly filing my income-tax returns, showing the above income correctly. Besides the above income, I have income from dividend on shares and mutual funds, where I have invested my pensionary benefits and savings. I am told that income from dividend on shares and mutual funds is not taxable, so in this belief I have not shown this income in the income-tax returns. Now, I have been told by one of my friends that such income is also to be shown in the return, though this income is not taxable. I have already filed my returns and the same has been accepted by the I-T Department. Please let me know whether I should show this income in my next year’s return or should I revise the return. Is there any penalty for not showing this information in the I-T returns already submitted? — SN Gupta

You have been correctly advised that the income exempt from the chargeability of income-tax is required to be reflected in the relevant column of the income-tax return. It would be advisable that the income-tax return filed henceforth should reflect the income which is exempt from leviability of income-tax. It may not be necessary to revise the earlier returns which have been processed and returned income stands accepted. There should not be any question of imposition of penalty on account of the mistake of not reflecting the exempt income in the Income-tax return as there were no mala fide intentions involved in this regard.