RAKSHA FOUNDATION ,BANGALORE vs. COMMISSIONER OF INCOME TAX (EXEMPTION) , BANGALORE

The Ld. CIT (E) erred in stating that, the trust has not brought out anything on records to establish the ultimate beneficiaries of the activities claimed to have been Page 2 of 5 undertaken. Though the expenses incurred/ debited are routed through the banking channels, the nature of expenses and purposes for which utilized is not substantiated.

We would like submit that, the appellant has carried out the charitable activities and spent amount on such objects as envisaged in the trust deed and the appellant has submitted all the relevant details and documents in support of expenses incurred and attended personal hearing and explained it to the satisfaction of officer as well.

Under the circumstances where the grounds of appeal with the substantiations are required to be filed within 60 days of the date of receipt of the order, the Appellant prays that it be permitted to add, amend, alter and improve upon the grounds of appeal.

The brief facts of the case are that the assessee is a trust established on 07/11/2019 and obtained the provisional registration from the A.Y. 2023-24. Subsequently, the assessee filed an application for permanent registration. The Ld.CIT(E) had rejected the application by relying on the report given by the JAO who has not recommended for registration.

As against the said order, the present appeal has been filed before this Tribunal.

The Ld.DR relied on the orders of the Ld.CIT(E) and prayed to dismiss the appeal.

We have heard the arguments of both sides and perused the materials available on record.

From the order of the Ld.CIT(E), it is prima facie evident that the Ld.CIT(E) had not considered the issue in detail but only extracted the report of the JAO in which he has not recommended for registration and on that basis, rejected the application filed by the assessee. We are not satisfied with order of the Ld.CIT(E) since the Ld.CIT(E) had not mentioned anything about the various documents and records filed by the assessee before him / her and therefore the order could be set aside only for the reason that the same is not a speaking order. The Ld.CIT(E) being a quasi judicial authority ought to have independently applied his / her mind to the facts of the case and not merely guided by the reports given by the juri ictional assessing officer. When the application was filed before the Ld.CIT(E), he might have sought for a remand report from the JAO but the said report should be confronted to the assessee since the report does not Page 4 of 5 recommend for granting the registration. From the order, we are not able to ascertain whether the said report has been furnished to the assessee and the details were called for from them before rejecting the said application. Further, we have perused the trust deed and in the aims and objectives, several objects were given. We have also perused the annual reports given for the said A.Ys. which shows that the assessee is doing various activities towards achieving their objects. We have also considered the financial statements enclosed for the A.Ys. 2022-23 to 2024-25. From the said documents, we came to the conclusion that the assessee is doing various charitable activities towards achieving their objects. We, therefore set aside the order of the Ld.CIT(E) since the various activities conducted by the assessee and the financial statements were not considered properly which would otherwise establishes the fact that the assessee is carrying on the charitable activities which are all mentioned in their objects and restore the issue to the file of the Ld.CIT(E) for denovo consideration. We also permit the assessee to furnish the various documents filed before us in support of their claim that they are entitled for registration u/s. 12AB of the Act.

In the result, the appeal filed by the assessee is partly allowed for statistical purposes.

Respondent 3. CIT

DR, ITAT, Bangalore

Guard file

CIT(A)