2024 (12) TMI 425

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.... of the Ld. Assistant Commissioner of Income-tax, Circle 3(4), Mumbai, order passed under section 154 of the Act, date of order 31/03/2021. 2. The revenue has taken the following grounds:- "(1) Whether in the facts and in the circumstances of the case and in law, the Ld.CIT(A) is correct in allowing the assessee's appeal holding that the assessee has rightly taken the figure of census 2001 for the purpose of classification of rural branch to claim the deduction u/s 36(1)(viia) ignoring the fact that provisional data of 2011 census was available to the assessee and that on identical issue the Hon'ble Supreme Court has decided the issue in favour of Revenue as reported in (2017) taxmann.com 65 (SC)/{2017] 246 Taxman 58 (SC)?" 3....

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....der of the Hon'ble Supreme Court in case of State Bank of Mysore vs ACIT, Circle 12, Bengaluru (2017) 79 taxmann.com 65 (SC) is duly applicable in assessee's case. The Ld.AO had considered the provisional data as on 01/04/2012 of the Census 2011 and 5 branches are having more than 10,000 population, so the claim under section 36(1)(viia) are correctly rejected. The Hon'ble Supreme Court is directed that the provisional data from beginning of the financial year should be considered. So, there is no infirmity in the ld. AO's view. He fully relied on the impugned rectification order. 5. On the other hand, the Ld.AR vehemently argued and only pointed out that the assessee has asked the census data from the Registrar General, India, Governmen....

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....n respect of these branches were disallowed total amounting to Rs. 18,40,28,816/-. On the other hand, it is the contention of the appellant that the the provisional census cannot be the basis for determining population for the purposes of section 36(1)(viia). Further, the final population data as per census 2011 was released only on 30.04.2013. Hence, the AO adopted the population figures based on the census which was published only on 30.04.2013 and the provisional census figure which was available before 01.04.2012 cannot be the basis for determining the rural branch for the purpose of claiming deduction u/s 36(1)(viia) for the relevant assessment year. In support of its contention, appellant has also enclosed letter issued from the offic....

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....de by the AO in the order passed u/s 154 of the Act dated 31.03.2021 on account of provisions u/s 36(1)(viia) for rural branches which were not rural is deleted. AO is directed to re-compute the total income of the appellant and to allow the provisions u/s 36(1)(viia) for rural branches taking the figure of census 2001 as the final population data as per census 2011 was not available on the first day of previous year for the relevant A.Y. 2013-14 i.e. on 01.04.2012. Thus, Ground no. 3 and 4 of the appeal raised are allowed." 6. We have carefully considered the submissions of both parties and reviewed the documents on record. The Ld. DR elaborated on the nature of census data, contending that the provisional data for the 2011 Census shoul....