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2021 (7) TMI 1299 - AT - Income TaxTreating the assessee as a dummy/facilitator and/or an accommodation entry provider - Estimation of income - Acceptance of book results - re-computation of the total income from the business and other heads as in the return of income - HELD THAT - Assessee in the course of the proceedings before the lower authorities had placed on record substantial documentary evidence which proved to the hilt the genuineness of the imports purchases and sales that were made by him during the year under consideration i.e A.Y. 2011-12. Now when the imports of the assessee had been physically cleared under the supervision of the Customs authority therefore there would be no justification in stamping the said transactions as bogus. Also the fact that the majority sales of the assessee were to exporters of repute was a material fact that substantiated the genuineness of his business transactions which we find had been disregarded and brushed aside by the lower authorities. As rightly observed by the CIT(A) the fact that the assessee s books of accounts had been audited by a Chartered accountant further substantiates the genuineness and authenticity of his business transactions for the year in question. Also the VAT paid by the assessee to the Maharasthra Sales Tax Authority qua the sales made to the various parties during the year under consideration instills confidence as regards the claim of the assessee of having carried out genuine business transactions during the year. Standalone reason for treating the assessee as a dummy/facilitator and/or an accommodation entry provider is his statement that was recorded in the course of the post-survey proceedings i.e way back as on 23.01.2009 which had been acted upon by the A.O without placing on record any material that would otherwise support drawing of such adverse inferences in the hands of the assessee during the year under consideration before us. Arbitrariness on the part of the A.O in treating the assessee as a dummy/facilitator and/or an accommodation entry provider during the year under consideration can safely be gathered from the fact that he had vide his respective orders passed u/s 143(3) for the succeeding years i.e A.Y 2012-13 A.Y 2013-14 and A.Y 2014-15 not drawn any such adverse inferences and had accepted that the assessee was carrying on actual/genuine business of imports/exports/trading in diamonds in the ordinary course of his business activities during the said respective years. As a matter of fact the only reasoning given by the A.O for concluding as hereinabove was the support that was drawn by him from the fact that in a like manner the A.O had framed the assessment in the case of the assessee for A.Y. 2010-11 and estimated his commission income qua the import/purchase/sale transactions which had not been assailed by the assessee any further in appeal. Be that as it may we are absolutely not at all inclined to accept the aforesaid reasoning given by the A.O for holding the assessee as a dummy/facilitator and/or an accommodation entry provider during the year under consideration. A similar estimation of income made by the A.O in the case of the sister concerns of the assessee viz. M/s Sunshine Import and Export Pvt. Ltd. and M/s Shine Star Impex Pvt. Ltd 2016 (9) TMI 1504 - ITAT MUMBAI with a direction to the A.O to accept the book results of the aforesaid respective assessee s further fortifies our aforesaid observations as regards the genuineness of the business activities of the assessee. In fact the aforesaid order of the Tribunal in the case of the aforementioned sister concerns of the assessee had thereafter been upheld by the Hon ble High Court of Bombay in Pr. CIT Vs. Sunshine Import and Export Pvt. Ltd. 2020 (3) TMI 554 - BOMBAY HIGH COURT wherein the appeal filed by the revenue was dismissed. Accordingly in the backdrop of our aforesaid observations finding no infirmity in the very well reasoned and balanced view taken by the CIT(A) the present appeal filed by the revenue being absolutely bereft and devoid of any merit is dismissed.
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