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Facts
The assessee claimed a deduction of Rs. 7,61,36,067/- under Section 80-IA for AY 2021-22. The Return of Income (ROI) was filed on 21.12.2021. The audit report was filed on time, but Form 10CCB was filed on 01.03.2022, after the ROI but before the extended due date for the audit report. The CPC processed the ROI on 28.12.2022, disallowing the deduction for non-compliance with filing Form 10CCB along with the ROI.
Held
The Tribunal held that the assessee had substantially complied with the conditions for claiming the deduction as Form 10CCB was filed before the processing of the ROI and before the extended due date for the audit report. The Tribunal relied on various judicial precedents, including decisions from the Supreme Court and coordinate benches of ITAT.
Key Issues
Whether the deduction under Section 80-IA is allowable when Form 10CCB is filed after the return of income but before the processing of the return and within the extended due date for filing the audit report.
Sections Cited
80-IA, 143(1), 139(1), 44AB, 115JAA, 80-IB
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Before: MS SUCHITRA RAGHUNATH KAMBLE & SHRI BIJAYANANDA PRUSETH
Assessment Year: (2021-22) (Hybrid Hearing) NY Green Energy Pvt. Ltd. Deputy Commissioner of Income-tax, बनाम/ (Formerly known as Sunkon Circle-2(1)(1), Surat, Aayakar Vs. Energy Pvt. Ltd.) 406, J.K. Bhavan, Surat Tower, Sagrampura, Putli, Surat-395 002 स्थायीलेखासं./जीआइआरसं./PAN/GIR No: AANCS 3841 H (Appellant) (Respondent) िनधा�रती की ओर से /Appellant by Shri Kaushik Kejriwal, AR राज� की ओर से /Respondent by Shri Ravinder Sindhu, CIT-DR सुनवाई की तारीख/Date of Hearing 17/07/2025 उद्घोषणा की तारीख/Date of Pronouncement 18/07/2025 आदेश / O R D E R
PER BIJAYANANDA PRUSETH, AM:
This appeal by the assessee emanates from the order passed under section 250 of the Income-tax Act, 1961 (in short, ‘the Act’), dated 23.12.2024 by the Commissioner of Income-tax (Appeals)/Addl/JCIT(A)-5, Chennai [in short ‘CIT(A)’] for the Assessment Year (AY) 2021-22, which in turn arises from the processing u/s 143(1) of the Act on 28.12.2022 by Centralized Processing Center/Assessing Officer (in short, ‘CPC’).
Grounds of appeal
raised by the appellant are as under: Sr.No Relevant sections Issue Ground of appeal of the IT Act 1 80IA Erroneous On the facts and circumstances of the disallowance of case as well as law on the matter, the deduction u/s 80IA learned CIT(A) has erred in disallowing deduction u/s 80IA amounting to /AY.21
22. NY Green Energy Pvt. Ltd. Rs.7,61,36,067/-. The said amount is the amount of profit derived from the business of power generation. This action is contrary to the provisions of the Income Tax Act, which mandates 100% of profit to be allowed as exemption 2 115JAA Erroneously disallowed On the facts and circumstances of the eligible MAT credit case as well as law on the mater, the bought forward CIT(A) has erred in disallowing MAT credit bought forward as per section 115JAA(5) of the Act, which explicitly states that MAT credit is respect of brought forward tax credit shall be allowable. 3 253 Prayer The appellant craves leave to add, alter, modify or delete any or all the grounds of appeal during the appeal proceedings.
3. Facts of the case in brief are that assessee filed its return of income (ROI) for AY 2021-22 on 21.12.2021 declaring total income at Rs.1,77,72,803/- after claiming deduction of Rs.7,61,36,067/- u/s 80-IA of the Act. Form-10CCB, as required u/s 80-IA of the Act, was subsequently filed on 01.03.2022. The ROI was processed by the CPC on 28.12.2022 by disallowing the claim of deduction u/s 80-IA of the Act. The claim of the assessee to allow credit of brought forward MAT to be adjusted against the demand raised was also rejected.
4. Against the order of CPC, the assessee filed appeal before the CIT(A). The CIT(A) noted that the assessee had also claimed deduction u/s 80-IA in the preceding year and the impugned claim for deduction u/s 80-IA of the Act in the instant ROI is for the second assessment year. The claim of assessee was allowed in the preceding year i.e., AY 2020-21. The CIT(A) further observed that the assessee had filed the audit report along with the return of income (ROI, in short) on 21.12.2021 within the time limit specified u/s 139(1) of the /AY.21-22 NY Green Energy Pvt. Ltd. Act. However, the assessee filed the prescribed Form No.10CCB on 01.03.2022. The assessee had argued that the specified date for filing audit report u/s 44AB was extended upto 15.03.2022 for AY 2021-22. Since the prescribed form was filed before the specified date, assessee contended that it had fulfilled all basic conditions for claim of deduction u/s 80-IA of the Act. However, the CIT(A) was not satisfied with the reply of the assessee and held that as per the provisions of Section 80-IA(7) of the Act, which is applicable for claim of deduction u/s 80- IA of the Act, the same cannot be allowed unless audit report in Form-10CCB is furnished along with the ROI. Therefore, in absence of accompanying audit report, the claim of deduction was not correct. Hence, the CIT(A) upheld the intimation u/s 143(1) of the Act by the CPC.
5. Further aggrieved, the appellant has filed present appeal before the Tribunal. The Ld. AR of the appellant filed a paper book including the ROI for AY 2021-22, Form-3CA/3CD, Form 10CCB, Form 29B, intimation u/s 143(1) and reply to the notice u/s 250 before the CIT(A). The Ld. AR has also filed various case laws in favour of the appellant. He submitted that the ROI u/s 139(1) and the audit report u/s 44AB of the Act were filed on 21.12.2021, within the specified date. However, Form-10CCB was filed on 01.03.2022 before the specified date for filing audit report u/s 44AB of the Act, which had been extended upto 15.03.2022. The ROI was processed by CPC u/s 143(1) on 28.12.2022. Thus, Form-10CCB had been filed much before the processing of ROI u/s 143(1) of the Act. Hence, deduction u/s 80-IA was allowable to the /AY.21-22 NY Green Energy Pvt. Ltd. assessee and the adjustment by CPC was not proper. The Ld. AR relied on the various decisions for the above contention: (i) CIT vs. G.M.Knitting Industries (P.) Ltd. (2016) 71 taxmann.com 35 (SC) (ii) CIT vs. AKS Alloys (P.) Ltd. (2012) 18 taxmann.com 25 (Mad), (iii) Niteshkumar J Shah vs. DCIT in dated 12.07.2023 and (iv) Desai Infra Projects (I) Pvt. Ltd. Vs. CIT(A) in dated 30.12.2024 and submitted that under similar facts and circumstances of the case, the Hon’ble Supreme Court, Hon’ble High Court and the Tribunals have allowed appeal of the appellants. Since the facts are similar, he requested that the appeal of the appellant may be allowed.
6. On the other hand, Ld. CIT-DR for the Revenue supported the order of lower authorities. He submitted that the appellant had not filed Form-10CCB along with the ROI and hence, the CPC has correctly disallowed the claim of deduction u/s 80-IA of the Act. The CIT(A) has rightly upheld the adjustment in the intimation u/s 143(1) of the Act.
We have heard both the parties and perused the materials on record. We have also deliberated the case laws relied on by the Ld. AR of the assessee. In the present case, the appellant filed ROI for AY 2021-22 on 21.12.2021 within the extended due date of 15.03.2022 (original due date 31.10.2021) declaring total income at Rs.1,77,72,803/-, after claiming deduction of Rs.7,61,36,067/- u/s 80-IA of the Act. The appellant had, however, filed Form- 10CCB subsequently on 01.03.2022. The ROI was subseqently processed by /AY.21-22 NY Green Energy Pvt. Ltd. CPC u/s 143(1) of the Act on 28.12.2022. It is, therefore, clear that the ROI was processed after the Form-10CCB was filed on 01.03.2022. However, the deduction so claimed u/s 80-IA under Chapter VI-A was not allowed by the CPC in the intimation u/s 143(1) dated 28.12.2022. The Ld.AR contended that the ROI and audit report were filed before the specified date. The Form-10CCB was inadvertently not uploaded along with the ROI but was filed 9 months before the processing of the return u/s 143(1) of the Act. The Ld. AR relied on various decisions of Hon’ble higher courts and Tribunals and contended that under similar facts, benefit of deduction u/s 80-IA has been allowed to the appellants. In view of above contention, we have again perused the records and carefully gone through the decisions relied upon by the Ld. AR. The Hon’ble Supreme Court in case of G.M. Knitting Industries (P.) Ltd. (supra) held that even though necessary certificate in Form-10CCB along with ROI had not been filed but same was filed before final order of assessment was made, that would amount to sufficient compliance for deduction u/s 80-IB of the Act. The appeal of Revenue was accordingly dismissed. The ITAT Ahmedabad Benches in case of Niteshkumar J Shah (supra) allowed the appeal of appellant under similar facts. In the said case, the ROI filed by appellant for AY 2017-18 was processed by CPC on 04.02.2019. Against the said intimation u/s 143(1) of the Act, appellant filed rectification u/s 154 of the Act, which was also rejected by the CPC. The appellant had claimed deduction u/s 80-IA, which was not allowed in the order u/s 154 of the Act. The reason for rejection of appellant’s /AY.21-22 NY Green Energy Pvt. Ltd. claim u/s 80-IA was that appellant filed Form-10CCB for claiming deduction u/s 80-IA on 11.10.2018, however, the due date for filing income tax return and audit report was 07.11.2017. The CIT(A) dismissed the appeal of appellant but the Tribunal after considering the facts of the case and various decisions including the decision of Hon’ble Supreme Court in case of G.M. Knitting Industries (P.) Ltd. (supra) allowed the appeal of the appellant by holding as under:
7.1 Accordingly, in the light of the above discussion, in our considered view, ld. CIT(A) has erred in facts and in law in not allowing the claim of the assessee on the ground that benefit of section 80-IA of the Act is not available to the assessee if the assessee does not e-file Form 10CCB along with return of income when the assessee admittedly furnished Form 10CCB, prior the return of income filed by the assessee being processed by the Department u/s 143(1) of the Act.” 7.1 We also find that the ITAT Pune Benches in case of Desai Infra Projects (I) Pvt. Ltd. (supra) allowed the appeal of appellant by deciding as under:
“6.4 Since the assessee in the instant case has admittedly field the audit report in Form-10CCB prior to the processing of the return, therefore, respectfully following the decisions cited (supra), we are of the considered opinion that assessee cannot be denied deduction u/s 80IA(4) of the Act. Accordingly, the order of the Ld. CIT(A) is reversed and the grounds raised by the assessee are allowed.” 7.2 Facts of the present case are similar to the facts of the decisions of the ITAT, Ahmedabad and Pune, cited supra. The ROI was filed by appellant on 21.12.2021. The Form-10CCB was filed on 01.03.2022. Subsequently, the ROI was processed by the CPC on 20.12.2022. It may be mentioned that the date for filing audit report u/s 44AB had been extended upto 15.03.2022 for AY /AY.21
22. NY Green Energy Pvt. Ltd. 2021-22. Thus, the appellant has filed the prescribed Form-10CCB before the extended date of filing audit report u/s 44AB of the Act. The ROI was processed u/s 143(1) of the Act by the CPC nine months after filing of Form- 10CCB. Hence, the case of the appellant is squarely covered by the decisions of Hon’ble Supreme Court and the co-ordinate Benches of ITAT Ahmedabad and Pune discussed above. Following the ratio of the above decisions, the order of CIT(A) is set aside and appeal of assessee is allowed.