2025 (11) TMI 1308
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...., condone the said delay and proceed to decide the appeal. 3. Briefly stated, the facts of the case are that the assessee is a retired employee of PSU Bank i.e. State Bank of India. In his return of income filed for the relevant AY 2020-21, the assessee claimed exemption u/s 10(10AA)(i) treating himself to be an employee of the Government before his retirement instead of exemption u/s 10(10AA)(ii) and thus claimed the refund of Rs. 1,96,170/- The return of the assessee was processed u/s 143(1) of the Income Tax Act, 1961 (the "Act") wherein the Ld. Centralized Processing Centre ("CPC")/Assessing Officer ("AO") made an upward adjustment of Rs. 5,45,848/- restricting the exemption to Rs. 3,00,000/- and bringing the balance encashment of unutilized Earned Leave to tax, thus, reducing the quantum of refund to Rs. 1,31,291/- as against the refund of Rs. 1,96,170/- claimed by the assessee in his ROI. The assessee filed a rectification application u/s 154 wherein the Ld. CPC/AO vide its order dated 06.10.2022 determined the balance payable at Rs. Nil and rejected the excess claim of Rs. 75,715/-. 4. Aggrieved by such order of the Ld. CPC/AO u/s 154 of the Act, the assessee filed an ....
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....lecom and that of BSNL u/s. 10(10AA)(ii) restricted to the maximum of Rs. 3 lakhs. The findings by these Courts clearly postulate that the maximum deduction available u/s. 10(10AA)(ii) is Rs. 3 lakhs only and not more than that under any circumstance. 5.6 Since, the decisions of the Hon'ble Delhi High Court in the case of Kamal Kumar Kalia &Ors, Vs Union of India, had not entertained a similar claim by a retiree of a Public Sector undertaking, the claim of the appellant is found to be untenable and the action on the part of the CPC to reject the claim of deduction u/s 10(10AA)(1) is upheld. 5. The assessee himself appeared before the Tribunal to plead his case. Giving the background of the case narrated in Para 3 above, he submitted that the impugned issue is covered in favour of the assessee by catena of decisions of the coordinate Bench(es) of the Tribunal. He relied on the decision of the Jaipur Tribunal in the case of Govind Chhatwani vs. CIT(A), Delhi (ITA No. 385/JP/2023 for AY 2020-21), dated 31.10.2023 and the decision of the "SMC" Bench of the Delhi Tribunal (ITA No. 81/DEL/2025 for AY 2020-21), dated 21.04.2025 and submitted that the assessee is entitled t....
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....cord. The bench noted that the assessee relying the decision of Herrble Delhi High Court has issued a notice to the Union of India in the case of Kamal Kumar Kalia & Ors. Vs. Union of India & Ors in WP(C) 11846/2019 dated 08.11.2019 wherein the court has given the following directions "8. We are however of the, prima facle, view that the grievances of the petitioner with regard to exemption limit under Clause (it) of Section 10 (10AA) not being raised since 1998, appears to be justified. This is so because over the decades, the pay-scales admissible to government servants, and even employees of the Public Sector Undertaking and Nationalised Banks and all others have been upwardly revised, keeping in view, the financial growth in the country as well as on account of rising inflation. The last drawn salaries have increased manifold since time and notification issued under Clause (il) of Section 10(10AA) was lastly issued, as taken note of hereinabove, on 31.05.2002. We therefore, issue notice to the respondents limited to this aspect. 9. Issue notice, learned counsel for the respondents accepts notice. Respondents should file counter affidavits be filed within six w....
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....vant finding of the Id. CIT(A) is reiterated here in below: "5.2.2 I have considered the facts of the case as also the submissions of the appellant. The appellant is a retiree from Bank and not any government organization. Here, reliance is placed on the decision of Hon'ble Delhi High Court in the case of Kamal Kumar Kalia v/s Union of India (2020) 268 Taxman 398/313 CTR 779 (Delhi) (HC) dated 08.11.2019, where the issue under consideration was whether the appellant being employee of Public sector undertaking (PSU) Ram Charan Gupta vs. ITO and Nationalised banks can be treated as government employee from the purposes of exemption u/s 10(10AA) of the 1.T. Act. In the said case, the Hon'ble High Court held as under:- "The petitioner, who were the employees of the Public Sector undertaking and Nationalised banks, filed writ contending that they were discriminated against Central Government and State Government. The Central Government and State Government employees are granted complete exemption in respect of the cash equivalent of the leave salary for the period of earned leave standing to their credit at the time of their retirement. Dismissing the petition ....
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....eans of stretch of imagination this organization can be treated as non- central government. Therefore, AO was not justified to disallow the claim upto the extent Rs 397100.00 without assigning any specific reasons and raising the demand of RS 118820.00 U/S 143(1) 2. Under the facts and circumstances CIT (Appeal) was not justified while restricting the claim Amounting To Rs 300000 ws 10(10AA) and rejecting the amounting to Rs. 397100.00 out of Rs 697100.00 which is earned leave encashment on retirement made by AO. Our submission:-it is to explain that he is govt employee therefore he claimed full amount of leave encashment u/s 10(10AA) Rs 697100.00 in his return copy of computation is enclosed and marked as annexure B however while processing u/s 143(1) it appears that claim amounting to Rs 397100.00 out of Rs 697100.00 has been disallowed which is leave encashment u/s 10(10AA) from the order of cpc Banglore without assigning any cogent reasons in fact the appellant is bank employee and nowhere in the section it has been mentioned that it is allowable only up to Rs 3.00 lacs in the case bank employee definition of other employee and govt has not been in described i....
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.... the relief to the assessee as per notification dated 24.03.2023. 7. We have heard the rival contentions and perused the material placed on record. The bench noted that the assessee relying the decision of Hon'ble Delhi High Court has issued a notice to the Union of India be the case of Kamal Kumar Kalla & Ors Vs. Union of India Ors in WP(C) 11846/2019 dated 08.11.2010 wherein the court has given following directions "8. We are however of the, prima facie, view that the grievances of the petitioner with regard to exemption limit under Clause (01) of Section 10 (10AA) not being raised since 1998, appears to be justified. This is so because over the decades. the pay-scales admissible to government servants, and even employees of the Public Sector Undertaking and Nationalized Banks and all others have been upwardly revised, keeping In view, the financial growth in the country as well as on account of rising inflation. The last drawn salaries have increased manifold since time and notification issued under Clause (11) of Section 10(10AA) was lastly issued, as taken note of hereinabove, on 31.05.2002. We therefore, issue notice to the respondents limited to this as....
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