Substance over label controls income character; service charges treated as rent, business fees allowed, and depreciation disallowance failed.

Service charges arising from a sub-licence and related service agreement were treated as part of rental income because no actual services were shown and the substance of the arrangement, not its label, determined the head of income; deduction under section 24(a) was therefore available. Litigation and professional fees incurred for business-related disputes were held allowable as business expenditure, there being no material to show personal or otherwise inadmissible outlay. Depreciation could not be disallowed merely on the basis of an earlier block assessment disallowance that had not survived in later appellate proceedings, absent fresh supporting material. The first appellate relief was maintained.

---

---

Issues: (i) whether the service charges received under the related service agreement were taxable as income from other sources or formed part of rental income eligible for deduction under section 24(a); (ii) whether litigation and professional fees paid in connection with business-related disputes were allowable as business expenditure; and (iii) whether depreciation could be disallowed merely because a similar disallowance had been made in the block assessment proceedings.

Issue (i): whether the service charges received under the related service agreement were taxable as income from other sources or formed part of rental income eligible for deduction under section 24(a).

Analysis: The receipts under the sub-licence arrangement and the service agreement arose from the same commercial premises transaction. The earlier appellate orders in the assessee's own case had already held that no actual services were shown to have been rendered and that the so-called service charges were, in substance, part of the rent. No change in facts or circumstances was shown for the years under appeal. The principle applied was that the real nature of the transaction, and not its label, determines the head of income.

Conclusion: The service charges were treated as part of rental income and the assessee remained entitled to deduction under section 24(a).

Issue (ii): whether litigation and professional fees paid in connection with business-related disputes were allowable as business expenditure.

Analysis: The expenditure was supported as relating to litigation undertaken by the company in the course of its business. The revenue did not establish that the amount represented personal or otherwise inadmissible expenditure. The matter was covered by the earlier orders in the assessee's own case, and no new material was brought to depart from that view.

Conclusion: The litigation and professional fees were allowable as business expenditure.

Issue (iii): whether depreciation could be disallowed merely because a similar disallowance had been made in the block assessment proceedings.

Analysis: The depreciation adjustment rested only on the earlier block assessment disallowance. The block assessment addition had not been sustained in later appellate proceedings, and no fresh material was brought to justify a separate depreciation disallowance for the years under appeal. In these circumstances, the earlier adverse finding could not, by itself, support the impugned addition.

Conclusion: The depreciation disallowance was not sustainable.

Final Conclusion: The departmental objections on all surviving issues failed, and the relief granted by the first appellate authority was maintained for both assessment years.

Ratio Decidendi: Where no actual services are shown and the surrounding facts establish that the receipt is in substance rent, its character is not altered by contractual nomenclature; similarly, an addition cannot be sustained for later years merely by repeating an unsustained block-assessment disallowance without fresh supporting material.

---