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Income Tax Appellate Tribunal, “C” BENCH KOLKATA
Before: SHRI SANJAY GARG & SHRI GIRISH AGRAWAL
Present for: Appellant by : Shri Miraj D. Shah, AR Respondent by : Shri Vijay Kumar, Addl. CIT, DR Date of Hearing : 09.02.2023 Date of Pronouncement : 23.02.2023 O R D E R
PER GIRISH AGRAWAL, ACCOUNTANT MEMBER:
This appeal filed by the assessee is against the order of Ld. CIT(A)-3, Kolkata vide Appeal No. 10176/CIT(A)-3/Wd-7(2)/2015-16 dated 21.09.2020 passed against the assessment order by ITO, Ward- 7(2), Kolkata u/s. 143(3) of the Income-tax Act, 1961 (hereinafter referred to as the “Act”), dated 27.03.2015.
Assessee has raised the following grounds of appeal:
1. That on the facts and in the circumstances of the case, the Ld. CIT(A) was not justified in confirming the addition of Rs.1,35,60,000/- made by the AO on account of share capital/share premium as unexplained cash credit by invoking the provisions of sec. 68 of the Act.
Inspa Interior & Exterior Products Pvt. Ltd. AY 2012-13 2. That on the facts in the circumstances of the case, the Ld. CIT(A) ought to have considered that the Ld. AO erred in law as well as on facts in ignoring the details, documents, letters and responses filed by the authorised representative of the assessee, letters from the directors and the reply received in response to notice u/s. 133(6) in support of the genuineness of the transaction and treating the increase in share capital/share premium amounting to Rs.1,35,60,000/- as ingenuine.
3. For that the appellant craves leave to supplement, cancel or otherwise modify any of the above grounds before or at the time of hearing.”
Brief facts of the case are that assessee filed its return on 28.09.2012, reporting total income of (-) Rs.21,57,839/-. Case was selected for scrutiny through CASS for which statutory notices were issued and served on the assessee. In the course of assessment proceeding, Ld. AO noted from the audited accounts of the assessee that it has raised fresh share capital by issuing shares having face value of Rs.10/- with premium of Rs. 90/- per share. Details of increase in the share capital including share premium of Rs. 1,35,60,000/- during the year is as under:
Particulars Charge per As on 31.03.2012 As on 31.03.2011 share (Rs.) (Rs.) (Rs.) Share Capital Issued 10 1,84,35,600 1,83,00,000 Share premium raised 90 2,02,24,400 68,00,000 Total 3,86,60,000 2,51,00,000
3. Ld. AO called for details and explanation on the above transaction to which assessee furnished its replies as noted in the assessment order. Further, ld. AO issued notice u/s. 131 of the Act on the assessee for personal appearance of the directors which remained non-complied. Owing to this non-compliance, ld. AO noted that assessee has failed totally to discharge its onus to establish the identity and creditworthiness of the share subscribers and genuineness of the transactions. Ld. AO also sought details on source of funding by the share subscribers and the justification for high
Inspa Interior & Exterior Products Pvt. Ltd. AY 2012-13 premium charged by the assessee. Ld. AO also required the personal production of the directors of the share subscriber companies. Thereafter, analysing various case laws and applying the doctrine of preponderance of human probabilities, Ld. AO held that the purported fresh capital along with the premium aggregating to Rs.1,35,60,000/- is nothing but assessee’s own money routed under the garb of fresh share capital, into the assessee’s business. He thus treated Rs.1,35,60,000/- as unexplained cash credit in the books of the assessee and added it back to the total income of the assessee. Aggrieved, assessee went in appeal before the Ld. CIT(A), who confirmed this addition. Aggrieved, assessee is now in appeal before the Tribunal.
Before us, Shri Miraj D. Shah, Advocate represented the assessee and Shri Vijay Kumar, Addl. CIT, DR represented the department.
Ld. Counsel for the assessee submitted that all the relevant details and evidence to explain the identity, creditworthiness and genuineness of the transactions were placed on record and the assessee had fully discharged its initial burden casted u/s. 68 of the Act. Ld. Counsel stated that the nature of these receipts is towards share capital and share premium which is by cheques from allottee companies who are income tax assessee. He further stated that assessee has explained the source and nature of receipts of fund and has brought on record all the documentary evidence in this respect. Ld. Counsel referred to a chart placed in the paper book, giving details of share application money of Rs.1,35,60,000/- received in the assessment year from the following shareholders along with no. of shares which is reproduced as under:
Inspa Interior & Exterior Products Pvt. Ltd. AY 2012-13
Ld. Counsel also referred to various documents and details furnished in respect of each of the investing companies, all of which are placed in the paper book. He referred to document set of one such company to demonstrate, detailed documents furnished, to establish identity and creditworthiness of the investing companies and the genuineness of the transaction. The documents furnished in respect of each of the investing companies which are listed in the index to the paper book placed on record, are as under:
Inspa Interior & Exterior Products Pvt. Ltd. AY 2012-13 Inspa Interior & Exterior Products Pvt. Ltd. AY 2012-13 Inspa Interior & Exterior Products Pvt. Ltd. AY 2012-13
Ld. Counsel further submitted that Ld. AO in his order has arrived at an adverse view merely on the basis of non-production / attendance of the director of the assessee and share subscriber companies in the assessment proceedings, without finding any fault or deficiency with the exhaustive material placed on record. He also submitted that though none attended to the summon issued u/s 131 of the Act, all the details and documents were placed on record which have not been controverted by the authorities below in any manner, whatsoever. As per him, since ld. AO was not impressed with these submissions who resorted to making addition of the entire share application money along with share premium, totalling to Rs.1,35,60,000/-, on the sole ground that compliance u/s. 131 & 133(6) of the Act by the directors of the assessee and share applicant companies was not done by way of their personal appearance. Ld. Counsel referred to the letter issued by the ld. AO wherein he has categorically acknowledge the fact of receipt of responses to notices issued by him u/s 133(6) of the Act on the share subscriber companies. The said letter is reproduced hereunder for ease of reference.
Inspa Interior & Exterior Products Pvt. Ltd. AY 2012-13
Inspa Interior & Exterior Products Pvt. Ltd. AY 2012-13 7.1 He also referred to the copies of bank accounts of the respective share applicant companies to demonstrate the genuineness of the transaction so also their audited financial statements wherein these investment transactions have been duly recorded and reflected. He thus, strongly submitted that Ld. AO had not brought anything contrary to the undisputed facts and has merely acted on whims and fancies. Further, a chart depicting the position of net worth of the share subscriber companies vis-à-vis their investments in the share capital of the assessee company is extracted below to demonstrate the creditworthiness of the said subscribers.
7.2. To buttress his submissions, Ld. Counsel placed reliance on the decision of Hon’ble Jurisdictional High Court of Calcutta in the case of CIT v. Dataware Pvt. Ltd. in ITAT No. 263 of 2011 dated 21.09.2011 wherein Hon’ble jurisdictional High Court held that -
Inspa Interior & Exterior Products Pvt. Ltd. AY 2012-13 “After getting the PAN number and getting the information that the creditor is assessed under the Act, the Assessing officer should enquire from the Assessing Officer of the creditor as to the genuineness" of the transaction and whether such transaction has been accepted by the Assessing officer of the creditor but instead of adopting such course, the Assessing officer himself could not enter into the return of the creditor and brand the same as unworthy of credence.”
7.3. He placed further reliance on the decision of Hon’ble jurisdiction High Court of Calcutta in the case of CIT Vs. Sagun Commercial P. Ltd. (ITA No. 54 of 2001 dated 17.021.2011) wherein it was held as under:
“After hearing the learned advocate for the appellant and after going through the materials on record, we are at one with the Tribunal below as well as the Commissioner of Income-tax (Appeals) that the approach of the Assessing Officer cannot be supported. Merely because those applicants were not placed before the Assessing Officer, such fact could not justify disbelief of the explanation offered by the assessee when details of Permanent Account Nos. payment details of shareholding and other bank transactions relating to those payments were placed before the Assessing Officer. It appears that the Tribunal below has recorded specifically that the Assessing Officer totally failed to consider those documentary evidence produced by the assessee in arriving at such conclusion. We, therefore, find no reason to interfere with the decision passed by the Commissioner of Income-tax (Appeals) and the Tribunal below and answer the questions formulated by the Division Bench in the affirmative and against the Revenue. The appeal is, thus, dismissed."
7.4. Reliance was also placed on the decision of Hon’ble Bombay High Court in the case of CIT v. Creative World Telefilms P. Ltd. [2011] 333 ITR 100 (Bom) wherein it was held as under:
“In the case in hand, it was not disputed that the assessee had given the details of name and address of the shareholder, their PAN/GIR number and had also given the cheque number, name of the bank. It was expected on the part of the Assessing Officer to make proper investigation and reach the shareholders. The Assessing Officer did nothing except issuing summons which were ultimately returned back with an endorsement "not traceable". The Assessing Officer ought to have found out their details through PAN cards, bank account details or from their bankers so as to reach the shareholders since all the relevant material details and particulars were given by the assessee to the Assessing Officer. In the above circumstances, the view taken
Inspa Interior & Exterior Products Pvt. Ltd. AY 2012-13 by the Tribunal could not be faulted. No substantial question of law was involved in the appeal.'' 7.5. Decision of Hon’ble Madras High Court in the case of CIT v. Pranav Foundations Ltd. (2015) 229 Taxman 58 (Mad) is also referred wherein it was held as under:
“In view of the fact that all the four parties, who are subscribers of the shares, are limited companies and enquiries were made and received from the four companies and all the companies accepted their investment. Thus, the assessee has categorically established the nature and source of the said sum and discharged the onus that lies on it in terms of section 68. When the nature and source of the amount so invested is known, it cannot be said to undisclosed income. Therefore, the addition of such subscriptions as unexplained credit under section 68 is unwarranted.”
It was also submitted that audited Balance Sheet of each of the share applicant companies reflected the amount of investment made by them in the assessee as against their respective net worth for which he also referred to the chart extracted above. He thus, contended that Ld. AO has made the addition with a predetermined mind set. Further, according to him, they are all registered companies under the Companies Act, 1956 and are active companies on the MCA portal.
Ld. Counsel also submitted that mere non-appearance of directors is no basis for invoking provisions of section 68 of the Act for which he placed reliance on the decision of Hon’ble Supreme Court in the case of CIT v. Orissa Corporation (P) Ltd. (1986) 159 ITR 78 (SC) wherein it was held as under:
“In this case the assessee had given the names and addresses of the alleged creditors. It was in the knowledge of the revenue that the said creditors were the income-tax assessees. Their index
Inspa Interior & Exterior Products Pvt. Ltd. AY 2012-13 number was in the file of the revenue. The revenue, apart from issuing notices under section 131 at the instance of the assessee, did not pursue the matter further. The revenue did not examine the source of income of the said alleged creditors to find out whether they were credit-worthy or were such who could advance the alleged loans. There was no effort made to pursue the so- called alleged creditors. In those circumstances, the assessee could not do any further. In the premises, if the Tribunal came to the conclusion that the assessee had discharged the burden that lay on him, then it could not be said that such a conclusion was unreasonable or perverse or based on no evidence. If the conclusion was based on some evidence on which a conclusion could be arrived at, no question of law as such could arise. The High Court was, therefore, right in refusing to refer the questions sought for. Decision of the High Court affirmed.”
9.1. Ld. Counsel submitted that instead of pointing out any defect or discrepancy in the evidence and the details furnished by the assessee, Ld. AO proceeded to adopt adverse inference only on the ground that the directors of the subscriber companies and the assessee did not appear personally before him. In this respect, he placed reliance on the decision of Hon’ble Jurisdictional High Court of Calcutta in the case of Crystal Networks Pvt. Ltd. v. CIT in [2013] 353 ITR 171 (Cal).
9.2. Ld. Counsel has also relied on the decision of the Co- ordinate Kolkata Bench of the Tribunal in the case of Satyam Smertex Pvt. Ltd. vs. DCIT, in vide order dated 29.05.2020, wherein the Coordinate Bench of the Tribunal, while further relying upon the decision of the Hon'ble Allahabad High Court in the case of CIT Vs. Raj Kumar Agarwal vide ITA No.179/2008 dated 17.11.2009 has held that non production of the director of the company, which is regularly assessed to income Tax having PAN, on Inspa Interior & Exterior Products Pvt. Ltd. AY 2012-13 ground that the identity of the subscriber is not proved, cannot be sustained.
Per contra, ld. Sr. DR placed reliance on the order of the authorities below and submitted that assessee’s own income has been infused in the guise of share capital through the allottee companies by layering the transactions, to make appear a non-genuine transaction as a genuine one.
We have heard the rival contentions and gone through the material placed on record. We note that Ld. AO without even going through and discussing the details submitted by the subscriber companies, insisted for personal appearance to prove the identity, creditworthiness of the subscribers and the genuineness of the transactions. To our mind, Ld. AO could have taken an adverse view only if he could point out the discrepancies or insufficiency in the evidence and details furnished in his office and also as to what further investigation was needed by him by way of recording of statement of the directors of the assessee and the subscriber companies. We draw our force from the decision of the Hon’ble Bombay High court in the case of PCIT v. Paradise Inland Shipping Pvt. Ltd. [2017] 84 taxmann.com 58 (Pan) wherein it was held that once the assessee has produced documentary evidence to establish the existence of the subscriber companies, the burden would shift on the revenue to establish their case. We also draw our force from the decision of Hon’ble Jurisdictional High Court of Calcutta in the case of Crystal Network Pvt. Ltd. v. CIT (supra) which held as under:
Inspa Interior & Exterior Products Pvt. Ltd. AY 2012-13 “We find considerable force of the submissions of the learned counsel for the appellant that the Tribunal has merely noticed that since the summons issued before assessment returned unserved and no one came forward to prove. Therefore it shall be assumed that the assessee failed to prove the existence of the creditors or for that matter creditworthiness. As rightly pointed out by the learned counsel that the CIT(Appeals) has taken the trouble of examining of all other materials and documents viz., confirmatory statements, invoices, challans and vouchers showing supply of bidi as against the advance. Therefore, the attendance of the witnesses pursuant to the summons issued in our view is not important. The important is to prove as to whether the said cash credit was received as against the future sale of the produce of the assessee or not. When it was found by the CIT (Appeal) on fact having examined the documents that the advance given by the creditors have been established the Tribunal should not have ignored this fact finding."
11.1. Ld. AO has not bothered to discuss or point out any defect or deficiency in the documents furnished by the assessee of the share subscribing companies though receipt of replies to notices issued u/s 133(6) to these subscribers have been categorically acknowledged in the letter extracted above. These evidences furnished have been neither controverted by the Ld. AO during the assessment proceedings nor anything substantive brought on record to justify the addition made by him. Ld. AO has simply added the amount of share capital and share premium on the ground that assessee has not produced the directors / shareholders. Thus, going by the records placed by the assessee of all the share subscribing companies, it can be safely held that the assessee has discharged its initial burden and the burden shifted on the Ld. AO to enquire further into the matter which he failed to do so. It is also noted from their audited financial statements and chart extracted above that all the investing companies have Inspa Interior & Exterior Products Pvt. Ltd. AY 2012-13 sufficient own funds available with them to make investment in the assessee.
11.2. A perusal of the impugned order of the Ld. CIT(A) shows that the Ld. CIT(A) has not discussed anything about the material facts of the case. He has not pointed out any defect and discrepancy in the evidences and details furnished by the assessee but simply cited certain case laws even without pointing out as to how these case laws were applicable to the facts and circumstances of this case. By simply reproducing the contents of the case laws without discussing about their application on the facts of the case, in our view, would not make the order of the Ld. CIT(A) justifiable speaking order and hence, the same is not sustainable as per law.
From the perusal of the paper book and the documents placed therein, it is vivid that all the share applicants are (i) income tax assessees, (ii) they are filing their income tax returns, (iii) share application form and allotment letter is available on record, (iv) share application money was made by account payee cheques, (v) details of the bank accounts belonging to share applicants and their bank statements, (vi) in none of the transactions there are any deposit of cash before issuing cheques to the assessee, (vii) all the share applicants are having substantial creditworthiness represented by their capital and reserves.
12.1. It is also undisputed fact that all the six share subscriber companies have been assessed u/s 143(3) of the Inspa Interior & Exterior Products Pvt. Ltd. AY 2012-13 Act by their respective Assessing Officer. For this, their assessment orders for AY 2012-13 are placed on record in the paper book. Accordingly, identity of these share subscriber companies cannot be doubted.
12.2. We further observe that provision for examining the source of source under the provisions of section 68 of the Act has been brought in by Finance Act 2012 w.e.f. 01.04.2013 as per which “where an assessee is a company (not being a company in which public are substantially interested), and the sum so credited consists of share application money, share capital, share premium or any such amount by whatever name called, any explanation offered by such assessee company shall be deemed to be not satisfactory unless: a) the person being a resident in whose name such credit is recorded in the books of such company also offers an explanation about the nature and source of such sum so credited and b) such explanation in the opinion of the Assessing Officer has been found to be satisfactory.” Since the instant appeal pertains to assessment year 2012-13, and the said amendment brought in by Finance Act 2012 is effective from 01.04.2013, it is not applicable on the case before us. Even otherwise, it is not in dispute that the assessee has filed all the relevant documents of the share subscriber companies and further, in order to prove the source of source, copies of bank statements, audited balance sheets of all the six subscriber companies are placed on record.
Considering the facts and circumstances of the case and the material placed on record, we find that assessee has discharged its onus to prove the identity and creditworthiness of the share subscribing companies and the genuineness of the transactions towards sum of Inspa Interior & Exterior Products Pvt. Ltd. AY 2012-13 Rs.1,35,60,000/- received during the impugned year. We, therefore, respectfully following the judgment referred hereinabove by the Hon’ble Courts and also considering the facts and circumstances of the case, are of considered view that since the assessee has sufficiently explained the identity and creditworthiness of the share subscriber companies and the genuineness of the transaction of applying for the equity shares of the assessee company and since nothing contrary to the evidence filed by the assessee has been placed on record by the Revenue, except the reason that the directors failed to appear to the summons/notices issued u/s 131/133(6) of the Act, we set aside the order of the ld. CIT(A) and direct the ld. AO to delete the addition made towards share capital and share premium u/s. 68 of the Act. Accordingly, grounds taken by the assessee in this respect are allowed.
In the result, appeal of the assessee is allowed.