I-T dept to validate UDIN by CAs in tax audit reports

The income tax department will validate with the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India (ICAI) the unique document identification number (UDIN) of chartered accountants when they upload tax audit reports, the finance ministry said on Thursday.

To curb fake certifications by non-CAs misrepresenting themselves as chartered accountants, the ICAI in 2019 made generation of UDIN from the ICAI website mandatory for every kind of certificate and tax audit report and other attests made by their members as required by various regulators.

The ministry said that in line with the ongoing initiatives of the income tax department for integrating with other government agencies and bodies, income-tax e-filing portal has completed its integration with the ICAI portal for validation of UDIN generated from the ICAI portal by the chartered accountants for documents certified/attested by them.

Income-tax e-filing portal had already factored mandatory quoting of UDIN with effect from April 27, 2020, for documents certified/attested in compliance with the Income Tax Act,1961 by a chartered accountant.

"With this system level integration, UDIN provided for the audit reports/certificates submitted by the chartered accountants in the e-filing portal shall be validated online with the ICAI," the ministry added.

It said this will help in weeding out fake or incorrect tax audit reports not duly authenticated with the ICAI.

If a chartered accountant was not able to generate UDIN before submission of audit report or certificate, the e-filing portal permits such submission, subject to the CA updating the UDIN within 5 calendar days from the date of form submission in the income tax e-filing portal.

If the UDIN for the audit report/certificate is not updated within the 15 days, such audit report and certificate uploaded shall be treated as invalid submission, the ministry added.