Rule 332 — Electronic furnishing of Forms, returns, statements, reports, orders, certificates, etc.
Sub-rule (1) gives the power to require electronic filing. The Principal Director General of Income-tax (Systems) or the Director General of Income-tax (Systems) may, with the prior approval of the Board, specify that any of the Forms, returns, statements, reports, orders or certificates, by whatever name called, as specified in Appendix III and Appendix IV, shall be furnished electronically — under digital signature, if it is required to be furnished under digital signature, or otherwise through electronic verification code.
Sub-rule (2) sets out what that authority must do. With the approval of the Board it is to specify which of those documents are to be furnished electronically; it is to lay down the data structure, standards and procedure of furnishing and verification, including modification in format if required to make a document compatible for electronic furnishing; and it is responsible for ensuring secured capture and transmission of data and for formulating and implementing appropriate security, archival and retrieval policies in relation to them.
Hundreds of documents sit in Appendix III and Appendix IV, and requiring each to be filed electronically by a separate amendment to the rules would be unworkable. The rule delegates that switch to the systems authority, but does not leave it unchecked: the Board's prior approval is required, the mode of verification is fixed by whether digital signature is required for the document, and the same authority carries the responsibility for the standards, the security of transmission and the archival and retrieval of what is filed.
The rule by itself makes nothing electronic. It creates the power, and a particular Form becomes electronically furnishable only when the systems authority specifies it with the Board's prior approval, so the operative document for any given Form is that specification, not this rule. The mode of verification is not a choice: where a document is required to be furnished under digital signature, that is how it goes; the electronic verification code route is for cases not covered by that requirement. Sub-rule (2)(b) is what allows a Form's printed format to be modified to make it compatible for electronic furnishing, so the electronic version of a Form may not look identical to its Appendix version. And the security, archival and retrieval obligations run to the systems authority, not to the person filing.
A certificate specified in Appendix III is at present furnished on paper. The Principal Director General of Income-tax (Systems), with the prior approval of the Board, specifies it for electronic furnishing and lays down the data structure and procedure. Because that certificate is one required to be furnished under digital signature, it must then be furnished electronically under digital signature; a certificate not carrying that requirement would go through electronic verification code instead.
You meet it as the reason a Form can only be filed on the Department's electronic system, and in the notified data structure and procedure that the filing must follow.
may with the prior approval of the Board, specify that any of the Forms, returns, statements, reports, orders or certificates, by whatever name called
under digital signature, if it is required to be furnished under digital signature; or
