Who Should Sign Form No 16 HR Or Accounts Heads

Who should sign Form No 16 (HR Head or Account Head) ?
Pls advice as i am in a reay big delima.
Also supporting acts will be appriciated.
regards
Sohail

Dear Sohail,
By raising the question who will sign Form 16 will not solve the problem. HR is deducting the TDS and Accounts is depositing the same with Govt Treasury. Morally both are equal responsible. Only signing the Form 16 is formality. Your management should identify the authority for signature of Form 16.
Usually the person who is making the payments is responsible for this. While registration with TDS the name address of the person has to be defined. In your case the same must have defined.
Ramakant.

Dear Shaiksohail,

It's not a matter to be debated. In most companies entire pay roll is being processed by the Finance & Accounts when both are integrated. Normally and also practically convenient that the Pay Roll section also shall be under the Finance & Accounts. It's very ideally made for each other and inseparable. Thus so far as employees' TDS is concerned the Pay Roll section process the pay slips and provide the figures for remittance of TDS to IT dept. which is directly under F & A. This process also directly linked to the Companies Income Tax return and hence is the primary responsibility of Finance & Accounts (it's healthier that both these operations are integrated and put under the control of one single head). Since Accounts section has the responsibility of IT return matters both Form 16 & 16 A authorisation for signing the Forms also should be under the Accounts. Moreover the Authorised Signatory is also responsible for not committing errors w.r.t. PAN/TAN and ensure the TDS/TCS are credited to the respective A/c.heads. A HR Signatory cannot be insisted to ensure such verifications. On the other hand if were to be under the HR the reconciliation becomes very difficult due to inadequate coordination and missing links in documentation and knowledge on the IT Return matters.

kumar.s.