Section 419 of the Income-tax Act, 2025

Section 419 — Recovery of penalties, fine, interest and other sums. Successor to s.229 of the 1961 Act.

Where this section sits

Section 419 is in Chapter XIX — Collection and Recovery of Tax, which runs from section 390 to section 430.

What this section does

The section makes any sum imposed by way of interest, fine, penalty, or any other sum payable under the provisions of the Act recoverable in the manner provided in this Part for the recovery of arrears of tax.

Why it is there

The recovery machinery in this Part is written around arrears of tax. Without this section an unpaid penalty, interest or fine would have no collection route of its own, and each would need separate provision.

Who it applies to

A person from whom interest, a fine, a penalty or any other sum payable under the Act is due
The income-tax authorities recovering such a sum

What this means in practice

The section creates no liability — it presupposes the amount has been imposed or is payable under some other provision, and supplies only the route for collecting it. Once that is so, no separate recovery proceeding is needed. Its reach is wider than penalties: the words extend to interest, fine, penalty and any other sum payable under the Act.

An example

Illustrative only, and invented for this page. The figures are chosen to show the rule biting, not taken from any real matter.

A penalty order is passed and the amount goes unpaid. Nothing further is needed to collect it: section 419 makes the penalty recoverable in exactly the manner this Part provides for arrears of tax, and the same would be true of unpaid interest or a fine.

Where you meet this section

Behind any recovery step taken for an unpaid penalty, interest or fine — the proceedings read as they do for arrears of tax, and this is the section that permits that.

The words themselves

shall be recoverable in the manner provided in this Part for the recovery of arrears of tax

Section 419, Income-tax Act, 2025.

What people get wrong

Arguing that the recovery provisions speak only of tax. Section 419 extends them to interest, fine, penalty and any other sum payable under the Act.
Expecting a separate recovery proceeding for a penalty.
Reading the section as creating the liability. It is a recovery provision only.
Confining it to penalties, when the words cover any other sum payable under the provisions of the Act.

What this replaced

The correspondence is the Income Tax Department’s own, from its comparison utility for the 1961 and 2025 Acts. A renumbering is the easy half; whether the words changed is the half that decides cases.

229 - Recovery of penalties, fine, interest and other sums

See the full 1961 to 2025 concordance.

What this page does not tell you. It does not reproduce the section. Everything above was written from the section’s own text as the Income Tax Department publishes it — the text is here, and nothing here is advice on your facts. Where a figure matters, read the sub-section it comes from.