Independent professionals vs employees: faculty engagement upheld as professional service, rejecting salary-style TDS treatment and default orders.

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....Faculty payments were held to fall under a contract for service, not a contract of service, so the recipients were independent professionals rather than employees. Administrative controls such as working hours, attendance requirements, restrictions on outside teaching, and curriculum-based supervision were treated as functional measures and not conclusive proof of an employer-employee relationship. The Tribunal also noted that the faculty were paid professional fees with a variable lecture-based component, received no employment benefits, had no written employment contract, and had reported the receipts as professional income under section 44ADA. TDS under section 194J was therefore correctly deducted, and the assessee could not be treated as in default under sections 201(1) and 201(1A); those orders were quashed.....