TDS credit cannot be denied on the ground of Technical/Typographical errors

[CA Bimal Jain]

The Income Tax Appellant Tribunal, Delhi (“the Tribunal”) in the case of SEJI MIYAZONO VERSUS ACIT, CIRCLE-INTL. TAXATION-1 (1) (1), DELHI - 2022 (12) TMI 632 - ITAT DELHI dated October 31, 2022 held that Tax Deducted at Source (“TDS”) credit of the bona fide assessee cannot be denied in case where the assessee committed technical/typographical error during return filing.

Facts:

Seji Miyazona (“the Appellant”) is a salaried employee. For the Financial Year 2017-18, the residential status of the Appellant as per Income Tax Act, 1961 (“the IT Act”) was of a ‘Resident but Not ordinarily Resident’. Appellant declared income of Rs. 1,25,04,980/- in return of income for the said period and claimed credit of TDS of Rs. 42,21,551/-. Centralized Processing Centre (“CPC”) of Income tax department did not grant credit of TDS of Rs. 3,48,701/- on the ground that such amount did not match with Form 26AS.  The Income Tax department issued an intimation under Section 143(1) of the IT Act, for mismatch of the TDS amount claimed and available to be claimed as per Form 26AS. Appellant filed an appeal before the Commissioner of Income Tax (Appeal) (“the CITA”) against the intimation issued under Section 143(1) of the IT Act. The CITA passed an order on August 18, 2020 (“the Order”) against the Appellant stating that impugned TDS amount is not eligible for credit due to technical/typographical error committed by the Appellant.

Aggrieved by the order passed by the CITA the Appellant filed an appeal before the Tribunal.

Issue:

Whether credit of TDS can be denied due to technical/typographical error committed by Appellant?

Held:

The Tribunal held that:

• On perusal of Form 26AS the impugned TDS credit was reflecting, which was on the contrary to the allegation made by Income Tax department.
• Since, the TDS was deducted from the income of the Appellant, credit of the Appellant cannot be denied due to technical/typographical error committed by the Appellant.
• The Tribunal sent the issue back to be Assessing Officer of factual verification of the amount of the TDS claimed and reflected in From 26AS and set aside the order passed by the CITA.

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