The Income-Tax department has launched electronic filing of returns in a limited way in seven major cities from this year to make it "hassle-free" for assessees besides making the tax administration efficient.

Announcing this, the chairman of the Central Board of Direct Taxes, P L Singh told reporters that this facility would be available in Mumbai, Delhi, Kolkata, Chennai, Hyderabad, Bangalore and Ahmedabad.

Initially electronic filing may be done through select banks in these cities. They are HDFC Bank, UTI Bank, IDBI Bank, ICICI Bank, Indian Overseas Bank and Bharat Overseas Bank.

This facility would be available in six bank branches in Delhi, five in Mumbai, four each in Chennai and Bangalore and three each in Kolkata, Hyderabad and Ahmedabad, he said.

Initially, the electronic filing was being done through an intermediary bank as individuals would have to secure digital signature first for filing electronic returns directly.

Necessary notification for this purpose has been issued, he said, adding the banks would charge Rs 100-400 for filing of returns per individuals depending upon the services they provide.

As already announced, Income-Tax returns could be filed this year up to September 30 and this was applicable for electronic filing as well, Singh said.

He said as a first step towards paper-less filing of tax returns, paper challans as proof of tax payment would be dispensed with for tax deduction at source or TDS from this year.

From next year, paper challans for Income-Tax payment too would be dispensed with, Singh said adding assessees would be able to file e-returns on their own once they acquire digital signature, which was a legal requirement.

So far only 5,000 persons have secured digital signature.

Regarding the issue of PAN, Singh said UTI investment, from whom the service was being outsourced, has already issued over 800,000 applications.

Of the 800,000, 433,000 applications have been received, of which 81,000 cards have been issued and an additional 133,000 cards have been processed.

Claming that all pending Income-Tax refunds were being cleared expeditiously this year, Singh said all those giving their bank account numbers could get their refunds transferred into their accounts.