The Madras High Court, while deleting penalty under section 271(1)(c) of the Income Tax Act, 1961, observed that voluntary withdrawal of rebate claim would not amount to concealment of particulars or furnishing inaccurate particulars.
A writ petition has filed by the Assessee, Mrs. Gopalratnam Santha Mosur for getting relief from penalty before the Single bench.
The Assessee was the co-owner of an immovable property situated in Tamil Nadu and she had sold the property and paid the entire capital gain is tax applicable in respect of the transaction. After that she claimed 50% of the capital gain’s tax as rebate under Indo Canadian DTAA. But the Income Tax Officer issued notice stating that tax rebate for the gain from the transaction of any property under DTAA is not applicable in the case of the assessee , because the property is situated in India. He further asked to show cause for why claimed rebate.
In response to the said show cause notice the assessee submitted a revised Income Computation Statement for the Assessment Year 2014-15 after disallowing the rebate claimed and the petitioner enclosed the letter along with revised computation and requested the respondent to give effect to the revised tax payable and issue the refund at the earliest. But the revised computation of the income was scrutinized by the respondent and the assessment was completed by the order and he has moved on to the penalty proceedings too.
The Assessee has submitted a revised computation withdrawing the rebate claimed and also produced all necessary documents before the respondent when the assessee was directed to appear. Considering this, the Court concluded that there is no concealment of income or submitting of inaccurate information, as all the relevant details were furnished by the assessee.
The Court further clearly mentioned that there is no findings that the details supplied by the assessee in its return were found to be incorrect and the assessee also filed a revised computation statement for the withdrawal of the rebate claimed voluntarily. Hence, it cannot be brought within the expression concealment of particulars or furnishing inaccurate particulars.
Read the full text of the Judgment below.
