The Centre on Friday announced income-tax exemption on the amount received by a taxpayer from his/her employer or from any other person for the treatment of Covid-19 during FY 2019-20 and subsequent years. The government also provided relief to the family members of a taxpayer falling prey to Covid-19 by providing income-tax exemption on the ex-gratia payment received by them from the employer or from any other person.

This exemption shall be allowed without any limit for the amount received from the employer, while the exemption shall be limited to Rs 10 lakh in aggregate for the amount received from any other person, a Finance Ministry statement said. Necessary legislative amendments for the above decisions shall be proposed in due course of time, the statement added. Further, the ministry has extended the timelines for various tax compliances to address the issue of the inconvenience being faced by the taxpayers due to the pandemic. It had earlier extended timelines for filing income tax and corporate tax returns.