Issues: (i) Whether consideration for engineering design review services constituted fees for included services under Article 12(4) of the India-Canada Double Taxation Avoidance Agreement; (ii) Whether the same consideration constituted royalty under section 9(1)(vi) of the Income-tax Act, 1961 and Article 12(3) of the India-Canada Double Taxation Avoidance Agreement.

Issue (i): Whether consideration for engineering design review services constituted fees for included services under Article 12(4) of the India-Canada Double Taxation Avoidance Agreement.

Analysis: Article 12(4) requires that technical or consultancy services either be ancillary to royalty-related rights or make available technical knowledge, experience, skill, know-how or processes, or consist of development and transfer of a technical plan or design. The engineering inputs, drawings and reviews were confined to a particular wind-tunnel project and did not enable the Indian recipient to independently apply the technical knowledge or processes in future projects. The services also did not transfer a technical plan or design capable of independent future use.

Conclusion: The consideration was not fees for included services and was not taxable in India, in favour of the assessee.

Issue (ii): Whether the same consideration constituted royalty under section 9(1)(vi) of the Income-tax Act, 1961 and Article 12(3) of the India-Canada Double Taxation Avoidance Agreement.

Analysis: Royalty requires payment for the use of, or right to use, specified intellectual property or designs. The contractual terms did not create or confer upon the recipient any right to use intellectual property independently; the supplied designs and technical inputs were project specific, and the service provider retained no arrangement granting a continuing right to use them.

Conclusion: The consideration was not royalty and was not taxable in India, in favour of the assessee.

Final Conclusion: Engineering design review services that neither make available technical capability nor confer a right to use intellectual property fall outside the treaty categories of fees for included services and royalty.

Ratio Decidendi: Project-specific engineering and consultancy services are not taxable as fees for included services where they do not make available technical capability for independent future use, and are not royalty absent a grant of a right to use intellectual property.

Issues: Whether waste and scrap arising from credit-availed capital goods are liable to duty on clearance despite not being manufactured by the assessee or covered by a specific tariff entry.

Analysis: Rule 3(5A) of the CENVAT Credit Rules, 2004 creates a self-contained obligation requiring payment of an amount equal to duty leviable on the transaction value where credit-availed capital goods are cleared as waste and scrap. The obligation arises from availment of credit and is not contingent on the scrap being a manufactured final product or independently classifiable under a tariff entry. The materially similar predecessor provision was applied on the same principle.

Conclusion: Clearance of waste and scrap of capital goods on which CENVAT credit was availed attracts duty on the transaction value, in favour of Revenue.

Ratio Decidendi: A statutory obligation to reverse or pay duty consequent upon clearance of credit-availed capital goods as waste and scrap operates independently of whether the scrap results from manufacture or has a separate tariff classification.

Issues: (i) Whether transportation, fixing, levelling and installation of boulders for a railway project qualified for exemption under Entry 12(a) of Notification No. 25/2012-ST dated 20.06.2012; (ii) Whether services supplied by a subcontractor for part of the railway-project work remained independently liable to service tax.

Issue (i): Whether transportation, fixing, levelling and installation of boulders for a railway project qualified for exemption under Entry 12(a) of Notification No. 25/2012-ST dated 20.06.2012.

Analysis: Entry 12(a) exempts specified construction, erection, commissioning, installation and related services provided to the Government or governmental authority in relation to a civil structure or other original works predominantly meant for non-commercial use. The contracted activity was transportation, fixing and levelling of boulders and was not construction of a civil structure or execution of original works within that entry.

Conclusion: The claimed exemption was unavailable; decided against the assessee.

Issue (ii): Whether services supplied by a subcontractor for part of the railway-project work remained independently liable to service tax.

Analysis: Circular No. 96/7/2007-ST dated 23.08.2007 recognises that a subcontractor providing a taxable service remains a taxable service provider, notwithstanding that its service is used by the principal contractor as an input service. The work order concerned transportation services, and the status of the provider as a subcontractor did not alter their taxability.

Conclusion: The subcontracted services remained liable to service tax; decided against the assessee.

Final Conclusion: The transportation-related services did not fall within the claimed railway-project exemption and were chargeable to service tax notwithstanding their performance as subcontracted work.

Ratio Decidendi: A subcontractor's independently taxable transportation service does not qualify for an exemption restricted to construction of civil structures or other original works merely because it is supplied for a larger government railway project.

Issues: Whether penalty for acceptance of cash sale consideration in contravention of Section 269SS was sustainable under Section 271D.

Analysis: The cash component of the sale consideration was received in circumstances where the assessee, an agriculturist, acted under a bona fide belief regarding the applicable tax requirements and required funds urgently. The amount was subsequently disclosed through a revised return before initiation of reassessment proceedings. In the identical land-sale transaction, penalty proceedings against a co-owner had been dropped; parity therefore supported identical treatment.

Conclusion: The penalty under Section 271D was not sustainable and was deleted, in favour of the assessee.

Issues: (i) Whether penalty for furnishing inaccurate particulars was sustainable in respect of disallowed professional-fee claims; (ii) Whether penalty was sustainable on the disallowance for non-deduction of tax at source from professional-fee payments.

Issue (i): Whether penalty for furnishing inaccurate particulars was sustainable in respect of disallowed professional-fee claims.

Analysis: One claimed professional-fee payment was established through the recipient's ledger as a loan advanced to and repaid by the assessee during the relevant year. Its debit as expenditure corresponded with a credit in the professional receipts and was revenue neutral. The amount was treated in assessment as a loan transaction, not as unexplained credit; consequently, it could not form the basis for penalty. For the remaining two claimed payments, the recipients denied receipt or the assessee failed to supply supporting particulars and corroboration. The claims were therefore not substantiated.

Conclusion: Penalty was unsustainable on the loan-repayment amount but was justified in respect of the two unsubstantiated professional-fee claims; the issue was partly in favour of the assessee.

Issue (ii): Whether penalty was sustainable on the disallowance for non-deduction of tax at source from professional-fee payments.

Analysis: The obligation of an individual or HUF to deduct tax under the second proviso to section 194J depends on gross professional receipts in the immediately preceding financial year exceeding the prescribed threshold. Reliance on receipts reported three years earlier, without verifiable material concerning the immediately preceding year, did not disprove the assessee's claim. Further, a statutory disallowance or rejection of a claim does not by itself establish furnishing of inaccurate particulars; penalty requires independent satisfaction.

Conclusion: Penalty on the disallowance under section 40(a)(ia) was not sustainable; the issue was decided in favour of the assessee.

Final Conclusion: The penalty is confined to the professional-fee claims that remained unsubstantiated and cannot be founded on the loan-repayment entry or the tax-deduction disallowance.

Ratio Decidendi: A penalty for furnishing inaccurate particulars requires an independently established default and cannot arise merely from a statutory disallowance where the factual basis of the tax-deduction obligation is unproved.

Issues: Whether the Customs authorities could rely on a notification amendment effective from 15.06.2026 to refuse consideration of provisional release of imported goods where the Bill of Lading was dated 12.05.2026.

Analysis: The amendment contained no express retrospective operation and could therefore operate only prospectively. The date of the Bill of Lading was treated as the date of shipment, consistent with the departmental position recorded in similar matters. Consequently, the amended notification could not be invoked to reject or decline consideration of provisional release. The applicable duty rate was left for determination in the adjudication proceedings under the statutory scheme.

Conclusion: The petitioner was entitled to consideration of its request for provisional release under Section 110A of the Customs Act, 1962; upon compliance with lawful conditions imposed, the goods were to be provisionally released, without prejudice to independent adjudication.

Issues: Whether annual receipts of educational wings operated by the same society could be treated separately for the monetary threshold under section 10(23C)(iiiad) of the Income-tax Act, 1961.

Analysis: The exemption is intended for genuinely small educational institutions. Separate nomenclature for different wings or levels of education does not establish distinct institutions where activities are conducted from a common campus under common management, ownership and infrastructure. The absence of separate books of account and independent administrative structures supported the treatment of the operations as one composite educational establishment. Fragmenting its receipts without evidence of independent existence would defeat the statutory monetary threshold.

Conclusion: The receipts were rightly aggregated; as they exceeded the prescribed limit, the assessee was not entitled to exemption under section 10(23C)(iiiad) of the Income-tax Act, 1961.

Issues: Whether penalty for under-reporting of income could be imposed where disallowance of lease-rental expenditure resulted from a bona fide and debatable view concerning the applicability of tax deduction at source provisions to payments made to GNOIDA.

Analysis: The disallowance arose because tax had not been deducted on lease-rental payments, the assessee having treated GNOIDA as a Government body and considered the payment covered by the provision excluding Government payments from tax deduction. The applicability of the tax deduction provision depended upon the status of GNOIDA and involved an interpretational question. The penalty was levied solely because the quantum addition stood confirmed, without a finding that the assessee's explanation lacked bona fides or that material facts supporting that explanation had not been disclosed, as required for exclusion from the statutory protection.

Conclusion: The disallowance arising from the debatable tax-deduction issue did not constitute under-reporting of income; the penalty under Section 270A was not sustainable.

Issues: Whether corpus donations received with a specific direction to form part of the trust's corpus constitute taxable income for determining the audit-report requirement and entitlement to exemption.

Analysis: Voluntary contributions are generally included in income, but contributions specifically directed to form part of a trust's corpus are excluded under the statutory scheme governing charitable trusts. Section 12 treats voluntary contributions other than corpus contributions as income for the purposes of exemption, while section 11(1)(d) excludes specifically directed corpus contributions. Corpus donations retain the character of capital receipts and are not chargeable to tax. Consequently, such receipts could not be included in computing income for deciding whether the threshold requiring audit and furnishing of Form No. 10B was crossed.

Conclusion: Corpus donations were exempt capital receipts; the assessee's income was below the taxable threshold, no audit report in Form No. 10B was required, and the assessee was entitled to exemption for the corpus donations.

Issues: Whether the writ court could interfere with seizure of imported industrial oil on the allegation that the petitioner's authorised representative was absent when the first sample was drawn.

Analysis: The alleged absence of the authorised representative at the first sampling was disputed: the authorities recorded his presence in the sampling report signed by panchas, while the petitioner denied authorising him. Such factual controversy could not be adjudicated under Article 226 of the Constitution of India. The same representative was admittedly present when samples were subsequently collected. The later MRPL test report showed that the declared industrial oil did not satisfy the prescribed parameters, and the identical testing parameters had already been substantively addressed in an earlier decision upholding the customs authorities' action.

Conclusion: The challenge to the seizure was not maintainable on the disputed sampling contention; the customs action was sustained, against the assessee.

Issues: Whether the petitioner was entitled to bail in view of his criminal antecedents.

Analysis: The petitioner had multiple criminal cases, including one of a similar nature, and the allegations involved substantial loss to the State exchequer. The absence of a posted Special Judge had delayed framing of charges; a direction was issued for early posting of a Special Judge so that the trial could proceed expeditiously.

Conclusion: The petitioner was not entitled to bail at this stage and was granted two weeks to surrender before the concerned court.

Issues: (i) Whether the additional grounds and the plea under Rule 27, founded on subsequent approval of a resolution plan, were maintainable before the Tribunal; (ii) Whether pending income-tax proceedings for periods preceding approval of the resolution plan could continue against a subsidiary covered by that plan.

Issue (i): Whether the additional grounds and the plea under Rule 27, founded on subsequent approval of a resolution plan, were maintainable before the Tribunal.

Analysis: The plea arose from undisputed subsequent events, namely approval of the resolution plan and its statutory consequences. A pure question of law going to the root of the proceedings, requiring no fresh factual investigation, may be raised before the Tribunal under its appellate jurisdiction. Entertaining the plea avoided adjudication of merits that could become academic.

Conclusion: The additional grounds and the Rule 27 plea were maintainable and were admitted in favour of the assessee.

Issue (ii): Whether pending income-tax proceedings for periods preceding approval of the resolution plan could continue against a subsidiary covered by that plan.

Analysis: Section 31 of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2016 gives an approved resolution plan binding effect against governmental and statutory authorities. The approved plan expressly covered affiliates and subsidiaries, provided for withdrawal and dismissal of pending tax proceedings concerning the pre-approval period, permanently extinguished related liabilities, and prohibited governmental or quasi-judicial action contrary to the plan. The income-tax department had participated in the insolvency proceedings and its objections had been rejected. The statutory resolution framework and the clean slate principle prevail over continuation of pre-resolution tax proceedings; the earlier winding-up jurisprudence concerning assessment jurisdiction did not govern an approved resolution plan under the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2016.

Conclusion: The pre-approval income-tax proceedings could not continue and stood extinguished under the binding resolution plan, in favour of the assessee.

Final Conclusion: All tax disputes in the batch relating to periods before the resolution-plan approval date were rendered academic, with the merits of the additions and disallowances left open.

Ratio Decidendi: A resolution plan approved under Section 31 of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2016 binds tax authorities and extinguishes pending tax claims and proceedings for the pre-approval period where the plan expressly covers them.

Issues: (i) Whether service tax was payable on the Maintenance Fund collected before formation of the housing society; (ii) Whether service tax was payable on the Corpus Fund and the unutilised Maintenance Fund transferred to the housing society.

Issue (i): Whether service tax was payable on the Maintenance Fund collected before formation of the housing society.

Analysis: Section 65B(44) read with Section 66B of the Finance Act covers an activity undertaken by one person for another for consideration. The developer had undertaken responsibility for maintenance of the common areas and amenities until formation of the housing society, and utilised amounts from the Maintenance Fund for that purpose. Such maintenance activity was not covered by the negative list and constituted taxable maintenance, management and repair service.

Conclusion: Service tax is payable on the portion of the Maintenance Fund actually utilised for maintenance services, against the assessee.

Issue (ii): Whether service tax was payable on the Corpus Fund and the unutilised Maintenance Fund transferred to the housing society.

Analysis: The entire Corpus Fund was transferred to the housing society without being utilised, and the sale agreement required its transfer as such. The balance of the Maintenance Fund was likewise transferred to the society. No service was agreed to be rendered or rendered against these amounts; their mere receipt before formation of the society did not establish consideration for a taxable service.

Conclusion: Service tax is not payable on the Corpus Fund or on the unutilised Maintenance Fund transferred to the housing society, in favour of the assessee.

Final Conclusion: Tax liability is confined to the amount actually deployed for maintenance of the residential complex, with the penalty correspondingly restricted.

Ratio Decidendi: Amounts collected by a developer are chargeable to service tax only where they constitute consideration for maintenance services actually undertaken; funds held for and transferred intact to the subsequently formed housing society are not taxable consideration.

Issues: Whether addition for share capital received from four investors could be sustained as unexplained cash credit under Section 68 despite scrutiny assessments of those investors accepting the sources of their investments.

Analysis: The investors' scrutiny assessments had accepted the sources of their investments, and no addition was made in their hands. The Tribunal's finding that the same investments could not consequently be treated as non-genuine in the recipient company's hands was a factual finding supported by the assessment records. No infirmity or substantial question of law arose from that finding.

Conclusion: The share-capital addition under Section 68 was unsustainable; the issue was decided in favour of the assessee.

Issues: Whether the provisional attachment of the property was sustainable as a benami transaction under Section 2(9)(D) of the Prohibition of Benami Property Transactions Act, 1988.

Analysis: Section 2(9)(D) applies where the person providing consideration for property is not traceable or is fictitious. The alleged loans forming the source of consideration were unsupported by proof of the lenders' financial capacity, income-tax records, repayment, interest payments, or reliable corroborative material. The unregistered loan documents lacked authenticity in the surrounding circumstances, and the cash consideration and substantial delay in validation of the sale documents reinforced the failure to establish the stated source. The appellant also failed to disclose a source for the balance payment and validation fees.

Conclusion: The transaction fell within Section 2(9)(D) of the Prohibition of Benami Property Transactions Act, 1988, and confirmation of the provisional attachment was sustained against the assessee.

Issues: Whether interim safeguards should govern clearance of ongoing and future imports during pendency of the Revenue's appeal against the order granting exemption benefit.

Analysis: Arguable questions requiring consideration at final hearing were identified. The Revenue's concern that its duty-recovery interests must remain secured during the appeal was treated as material, while the importer's entitlement to clear consignments under the existing appellate order was also protected. An equitable interim arrangement, rather than an unconditional stay, was considered appropriate.

Outcome: The importer may provisionally clear ongoing and future consignments upon furnishing a bond for the full differential duty and a bank guarantee for 50% of that duty, pending the appeal.

Issues: (i) Whether the assessee's audited books could be rejected and its income computed under the presumptive scheme for turnkey power projects; (ii) Whether the Comparable Uncontrolled Price method was the appropriate method for determining the arm's length price of transactions between the head office and the Indian project office.

Issue (i): Whether the assessee's audited books could be rejected and its income computed under the presumptive scheme for turnkey power projects.

Analysis: The assessee maintained the prescribed books, obtained audit, and claimed lower profit or loss under the statutory option available to a foreign company undertaking a qualifying turnkey power project. The concurrent factual findings established that the alleged discrepancies, including losses, work-in-progress, revenue recognition, and freight-cost variations, did not disclose material defects in the books. A loss, satisfactorily explained by increased ocean-freight costs, could not by itself justify rejection of accounts or estimation of profit.

Conclusion: The books were not liable to rejection and the assessee's declared income or loss could not be replaced by deemed profit computation. This issue is in favour of the assessee.

Issue (ii): Whether the Comparable Uncontrolled Price method was the appropriate method for determining the arm's length price of transactions between the head office and the Indian project office.

Analysis: The project office executed the contract in India, with the relevant risks and rewards recorded there, while the third-party contract price between the head office and the customer provided a direct internal comparable. In the absence of a separate assignment agreement between the head office and project office, and where the entire contract revenue was attributed to India, the contractual price satisfied the applicable comparability requirements. The comparable companies selected for the Transactional Net Margin Method were rejected on reasoned factual findings.

Conclusion: The internal Comparable Uncontrolled Price method was the most appropriate method for determining arm's length price, and no transfer-pricing adjustment based on the Transactional Net Margin Method was warranted. This issue is in favour of the assessee.

Final Conclusion: No substantial question of law arose from the concurrent findings accepting the assessee's accounts and applying the internal comparable method for arm's length pricing.

Ratio Decidendi: Where audited accounts disclose no material defect, losses alone cannot warrant presumptive profit assessment; and where a reliable direct internal comparable is available, the Comparable Uncontrolled Price method prevails over a less direct net-margin method for arm's length pricing.

Issues: Whether Notification No. 53/2023-Central Tax dated 02.11.2023 applied to an appeal filed after its issuance but before 31.01.2024, notwithstanding that the appeal had not previously been rejected as time-barred.

Analysis: Section 107 of the Central Goods and Services Tax Act, 2017 restricts the Appellate Authority's power to condone delay. Notification No. 53/2023-Central Tax, issued under Section 148, created a special procedure for appeals against orders under Sections 73 and 74 that could not be filed within the ordinary limitation period, appeals rejected solely for delay, pending appeals, and appeals filed within the extended cut-off date, subject to the prescribed payment conditions. The notification was intended to benefit taxpayers while securing collection of the admitted and prescribed disputed tax amounts. A taxpayer satisfying the payment conditions and filing before 31.01.2024 could not be denied that benefit merely because the appeal had not earlier been rejected on limitation. The Appellate Authority was required to take cognizance of the notification while deciding the appeal.

Conclusion: Notification No. 53/2023-Central Tax applied to the petitioner's appeal filed before 31.01.2024 upon fulfilment of its payment conditions; rejection solely on limitation was unsustainable.

Issues: (i) Whether reassessment could be initiated on the basis of material examined during the original scrutiny assessment; (ii) Whether a co-operative society was entitled to deduction for interest earned on investments with co-operative banks.

Issue (i): Whether reassessment could be initiated on the basis of material examined during the original scrutiny assessment.

Analysis: The original scrutiny assessment specifically considered the claim relating to interest income from co-operative banks. The Assessing Officer accepted that claim while making distinct additions concerning interest from nationalised banks and other income. The subsequent notice proceeded on the same material and the same claim already examined in scrutiny.

Conclusion: The reassessment amounted to a mere change of opinion and was invalid, in favour of the assessee.

Issue (ii): Whether a co-operative society was entitled to deduction for interest earned on investments with co-operative banks.

Analysis: The applicable precedent established that a co-operative bank is itself a co-operative society for this purpose, and interest earned by a co-operative society from investments with such bank qualifies for the deduction.

Conclusion: Deduction under Section 80P(2)(d) was available on the interest income earned from co-operative banks, in favour of the assessee.

Final Conclusion: The reassessment action lacked both a valid jurisdictional basis and substantive merit.

Ratio Decidendi: Reassessment cannot be founded on a mere change of opinion where the relevant claim and material were examined in the original scrutiny assessment; interest earned by a co-operative society from investments with a co-operative bank qualifies for the applicable deduction.

Issues: (i) Whether interest earned on unutilised funds placed in bank deposits for business purposes was eligible for deduction under section 80IAB; (ii) Whether disallowance under section 14A read with rule 8D could exceed the exempt income earned.

Issue (i): Whether interest earned on unutilised funds placed in bank deposits for business purposes was eligible for deduction under section 80IAB.

Analysis: Interest earned on fixed deposits which the assessee was compelled to maintain for business purposes at the insistence of financial institutions was incidental to its business activities. Such receipt could not be assessed as income from other sources when it formed part of business income.

Conclusion: The interest income was eligible for deduction under section 80IAB, in favour of the assessee and against the revenue.

Issue (ii): Whether disallowance under section 14A read with rule 8D could exceed the exempt income earned.

Analysis: The settled position restricted expenditure disallowance computed under section 14A read with rule 8D to the amount of exempt income earned.

Conclusion: Disallowance under section 14A read with rule 8D cannot exceed exempt income, in favour of the assessee and against the revenue.

Final Conclusion: The assessee's business-linked bank-deposit interest qualified for the statutory deduction, and the expenditure disallowance was confined to the exempt income amount. The cross-objection question did not survive after resolution of the deduction issue.