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Income Tax Appellate Tribunal, HYDERABAD BENCHES “B”, HYDERABAD
Before: SHRI RAMA KANTA PANDA & SHRI K.NARASIMHA CHARY
आदेश / ORDER PER K. NARASIMHA CHARY, JM: Challenging the order dated 30-12-2014, passed by the learned Assessing Officer upon the directions of the learned Dispute Resolution Panel, Hyderabad (“DRP”) in the case of M/s.EPAM Systems India Private Limited (Previously known as Alliance Global Service IT India Private Limited), (“the assessee”) for the AY.2010-11, Revenue preferred this appeal.
Revenue preferred this appeal with a delay of 52 days. Revenue attributed the reason for delay in filing the appeal that (a) the authorization for filing appeal was received in March, 2015 which is peak period for time barring assessments and (b) M/s.APBCL which is also assessed in this office had filed writ petition in Hon'ble High Court which had to be followed up with personal attendance in Hon'ble High Court. There is no reason as to why this explanation of the Revenue cannot be accepted. Revenue does not stand to gain by allowing the appeal to be barred by limitation. The highest that would happen by condoning the delay is that a cause could be decided on merits. As a matter of fact, Ld. Counsel for the assessee fairly concedes to condone the delay. Recording the same, we condone the delay and proceed to hear the matter on merits.
At the outset, the ld. DR brought to our attention that CBDT vide Circular No. 17/2019 dated 8th August 2019 has decided that the Revenue would not prefer any appeal before the Tribunal if the tax effect is less than Rs. 50 lakhs. Therefore, he pleaded that the appeal of the Revenue be decided as per the Instruction of the CBDT. None is present on behalf of the assessee.
We have gone through the records and we find that the CBDT vide Circular No. 17/2019 dated 8th August 2019 has enhanced the monetary limit for filing the appeal by the Revenue before Income Tax Appellate Tribunal, Hon’ble High Courts and Hon’ble Supreme Court. The relevant para of the aforesaid circular is reproduced as under :-
“2. As a step towards further management of litigation, it has been decided by the Board that monetary limits for filing of appeals in income- tax cases be enhanced further through amendment in Para 3 of the Circular mentioned above and accordingly, the table for monetary limits specified in Para 3 of the Circular shall read as follows:
S.No. Appeals/SLPs in Income-tax matters Monetary Limit (Rs) 1. Before Appellate Tribunal 50,00,000 2. Before High Court 1,00,00,000 3. Before Supreme Court 2,00,00.000 3. Further, with a view to provide parity in filing of appeals in scenarios where separate order is passed by higher appellate authorities for each assessment year vis-a-vis where composite order for more than one assessment years is passed, para 5 of the circular is substituted by the following para: "5. The Assessing Officer shall calculate the tax effect separately for every assessment year in respect of the disputed issues in the case of every assessee. If, in the case of an assessee. the disputed issues arise in more than one assessment year, appeal can be filed in respect of such assessment year or years in which the tax effect in respect of the disputed issues exceeds the monetary' limit specified in para 3. No appeal shall be filed in respect of an assessment year or y ears in which the tax effect is less than the monetary limit specified in para 3. Further, even in the case of composite order of any High Court or appellate authority which involves more than one assessment year and common issues in more than one assessment year, no appeal shall be filed in respect of an assessment year or years in which the tax effect is less than the monetary limit specified in para 3. In case where a composite order/ judgement involves more than one assessee. each assessee shall be dealt with separately.”
4. The said modifications shall come into effect from the date of issue of this Circular.
5. The same may be brought to the notice of all concerned.
6. This issues under section 268A of the Income-tax Act, 1961.”
Tax effect involved in the appeal of the Revenue is below Rs. 50 lakhs. There is no dispute that the Board’s instructions or directions issued to the Income-tax authorities are binding on those authorities, therefore, the Revenue should have withdrawn/not pressed the present appeal in view of the aforesaid instruction since the tax effect in the instant appeal is less than the amount of Rs. 50 lakhs. The issue of applicability of the above circular to pending appeals has been decided by the coordinate bench in Dinesh Madhavlal Patel [TS-469-ITAT-2019(Ahd)] 2019-TIOL- 1556-ITAT-AHM dated 14th August, 2019.
In view of the above, Circular No. 17/2019 dated 08-08-2019 is applicable to all pending appeals. This appeal is, accordingly, not maintainable since the tax effect is less than Rs. 50 lakhs. We are, however, inclined to give liberty to Revenue to file miscellaneous application if for any reason, at a later point of time, it turns out that the subject matter of the appeal falls under any instances stated in para No. 10 of the CBDT Circular No. 3/2018 dated 11-07-2018.