TaxTMI 
TaxTMI 
2018 (2) TMI 368
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....sessment for the assessment year 2010-11. 2. Brief facts are as under: Petitioner is a co-operative bank. For the assessment year 2010- 11, the petitioner had filed the return of income on 24.09.2010 declaring total income of Rs. 1.36 crores (rounded off). Such return contained an amount of Rs. 65 lacs paid by the petitioner towards gratuity to the employees and claimed full deduction of such amount from the gross total income. The return was taken in scrutiny. After detailed scrutiny, the Assessing Officer passed the order of assessment under section 143(3) of the Act on 19.03.2013. Barring two minor adjustments, return income was accepted. In any case, there was no addition of the gratuity amount of which deduction was claimed by the pe....
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....roved gratuity fund. Rule 4(1) of Part C of Fourth Schedule to the Income Tax Act, 1961 provides for an application being made for approval. Rule 6 provides that if a gratuity fund for any reason cases to be an approved gratuity fund, the trustees of the fund shall, nevertheless, remain liable to tax gratuity paid to any employee. The conditions of approval are set out in Rule 3. The approval is to be granted by the Chief Commissioner or Commissioner of Income Tax, who has been vested with that power under rule 2(1) of Part C of Fourth Schedule. Thus, while filing the return of income and during the assessment proceedings, the assessee had presented incorrect details leading to escapement of taxable income of Rs. 65,00,000/-. The said om....
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....hich, such claim was made and accepted. The bank has been paying premium under the said scheme year after year since the year 1976. These payments are duly recorded in the audited books of accounts and have always been accepted by the Assessing Authorities. In the earlier orders of assessments, many of which were framed under section 143(3) of the Act. Principally, it was therefore contended that reopening of the assessment would amount to change of opinion and, in any case, there was no failure on part of the assessee to disclose truly and fully all material facts. 6. Ignoring such objections of the petitioner, the Assessing Officer decided to proceed further with the reassessment by rejecting the objections under an order dated 23.10.201....
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....These details were available on the record and further elaborated during the scrutiny assessment. In response to the Assessing Officer's letter dated 28.08.2012 under which he raised several queries, the petitioner had also furnished a proof of the payment made for provident fund in the balance-sheet which included the said further sum of Rs. 15.86 lacs. 8. It further appears that during the course of assessment, the petitioner had produced an agreement between the LIC and the trustees of the gratuity scheme under which, the LIC would manage the fund. This also contained a clause whether the scheme was required to be approved to which, the remarks made were in the affirmative. 9. The case of the petitioner further is that the scheme w....
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....r, factually, the scheme was approved by the Commissioner way back in the year 1976. It was only after it, the LIC would undertake the responsibility to manage the same. It was on this basis that the petitioner had been raising the claim year after year right since its inception every year. In none of the past years, any such issue was raised by the Assessing Officers in this respect. Therefore, the petitioner produced what it had been producing all along namely, the contribution made towards the fund and the agreement of the LIC to manage the fund. If the Assessing Officer had any doubt about such a claim, it was always open for him to examine it, ask the petitioner to fulfill further requirements. Merely because the petitioner did not pro....