TaxTMI 
TaxTMI 
2021 (7) TMI 143
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....ings of the Ld. Assessing Officer in assessing the total income of the appellant trust at Rs. 2,17,20,000/-, as against the income declared by the appellant in the return of income at Rs. Nil, thereby adding the voluntary donations received by the appellant to the extent of Rs. 2,17,30,000/- as appellant's anonymous donations within the provisions of section 115BBC of the I.T. Act, 1961, without appreciating the facts that the donors were of different rural villages who were the well-wishers of the appellant trust and made donations for fulfillment of the educational activities of the appellant trust and without allowing proper and reasonable opportunity of being heard to the appellant, merely on the basis of the enquiries made in respect of only 20 donors whose addresses were and identification were also provided to the Assessing Officer, arbitrarily holding that the donations received from 133 donors were anonymous donations in the assessment order. The additions made in respect of all such donations received by the appellant from 133 donors without making any necessary enquiry and proving the same as anonymous within the provisions of section 115BBC of the said Act by the Ld....
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....for exemption u/s. 10(23C)(iiiab) of the I.T. Act, 1961 and therefore, even if any addition was made, the same also had qualified for exemption under the said section. Therefore, if this aspect had been considered by the lower authorities, neither any addition could be made nor the same was required to be confirmed. The appellant prays for considering the above and delete the addition. ii. On the facts and in the circumstances of the case and in law, the Learned C.I.T. [A] erred in confirming the observation and findings of the Ld. Assessing Officer Without appreciating the facts that the appellant is a charitable trust registered u/s. 12A of the I.T. Act, 1961 by the Commissioner of Income Tax and it has been carrying out the educational activities by running educational institutes in most rural areas in the District of Sangli and the donations were given by a number of well-wishers of the appellant residing in the rural areas who are either farmers or small traders and therefore one sufficient opportunity was provided to the appellant to furnish the necessary confirmations/proofs of identification by the lower authorities of the donors, the appellant could furnish the same and ....
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....e details as to the name, address and identity of the donors it was not possible for the Assessing Officer to examine the veracity of the genuineness of the donations received. He further submitted that the information filed by the appellant before the Assessing Officer is just before the assessment was getting time barred. He further submitted that the notices u/s. 133(6) of the Act issued to some of the donors have returned un-served with the remarks "Address not found". He further submitted that the assessee had not filed the complete details, so as to enable the Assessing Officer to carry out necessary verification. He further submitted that during the course of remand proceedings pursuant to the direction of this Tribunal, the appellant trust had filed new set of the information. Therefore, he prayed that the order of the lower authorities should be sustained and no interference is called for. 8. We heard the rival submissions and perused the material on record. The issue in the present appeal relates to the taxability or otherwise of donations received during the year under consideration. The undisputed facts of the case are that the appellant is a society registered under t....
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...., we attempted to verify the veracity of information filed before the Assessing Officer by calling for remand report from the Assessing Officer on the following lines:- "(i) The ld. Sr. CIT-DR is requested to furnish the remand report from the Assessing Officer as to (i) whether the assessee trust had maintained the prescribed record in respect of the donations received by it during the financial year 2015-16? (ii) Whether the details of donations filed before the Assessing Officer during the assessment proceedings are tallying with the information contained in the record? (iii) Whether the details contained in the record is complete or not?" 12. The Assessing Officer submitted that the assessee had created a new set of record different from one filed during the course of original assessment proceedings. The AO also made remark that information on the assessment records tallies with the record maintained by the appellant society. We are unable to discern the implication of this remark. The allegation of the AO that a new set of record different from the original record was produced before Assessing Officer in remand proceedings remain uncontroverted. The following material f....
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.... new set of information different from what was filed at the time of original assessment proceedings. This conduct of the assessee made us to believe that the information filed during the original assessment proceedings is not correct or incomplete. 14. Thus, on consideration of the totality of the circumstances of the case, we are of the considered opinion that the transaction of receipt of donation is a sham, a make believe story, a device adopted by the appellant society to bring on record the undisclosed income of the appellant society. Therefore, we do not see any reason to interfere with the orders of the lower authorities. 15. Perhaps, our view would have been to remand the matter to the AO, had the appellant society not adopted any dilatory tactics before the assessing authority as well as produced the correct record before AO during the course of remand proceedings. We are inclined to believe that the appellant society deliberately adopted the dilatory tactics before the assessing authority with a view to not to enable the AO to carry out the verification so as to satisfy himself about genuineness of the donations received. It is settled principle of law that the assesse....