Rediff has an step by step guide for filing your income tax.

Some key points are:

What form do you need to fill?

ITR-1: Income from salary, pension and interest earned in a financial year

ITR-2: Capital gains, income/loss from house property and income from any other source

Checklist

• Enter all the details in CAPITAL letters
• Ensure that name, address and other personal details are entered correctly
• Double-check PAN number, bank account details and the MICR code you write
• Store the acknowledgment safely property and income from any other source.

You can file your income tax return online, however, you still have to visit income tax office for acknowledgment if you don’t have digital signature. You can get your own digital signature which starts from Rs. 800/- for two years.

You can also avail third party services like Taxsmile and Taxshax to file your Income tax return, the service starts from as low as Rs. 181 on Taxshax and Rs. 250 on Taxsmile.

Cartoon by Satish Acharya