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2018 (9) TMI 2131 - AT - Income TaxDeduction u/s 80-IA - initial assessment year for claim of deduction - whether the lower authorities are right in law and facts of the case in concluding that A.Y 2006-07 is to be taken as the initial assessment year for claim of deduction u/s 80-IA(4)(ii) by the assessee? - HELD THAT:- We find that an eligible assessee has the option for claiming deduction under Sec. 80IA(1) for a period of ten consecutive years falling within a period of fifteen years beginning from the year in which the undertaking or the enterprise had started providing telecommunication services. However, as can be inescapably gathered from the term “consecutive‟ used in sub-section (2) of Sec. 80-IA, once the assessee has exercised such option and claimed deduction under Sec. 80-IA(1) then his entitlement to claim deduction would stand restricted to the ten consecutive years beginning from the year in which it was first claimed. We are of the considered view that the fact as to when the assessee had for the first time exercised its option and claimed deduction under Sec. 80-IA, as observed by us at length hereinabove, would be the only decisive factor for identifying the “initial assessment year” opted by the assessee for claim of deduction u/s 80-IA. We thus not being impressed with the adverse inferences drawn by the lower authorities by referring to the opinion of Mr. Bharat Agarwal(consultant-an associate of the auditor of the assessee company), thus vacate the adverse inferences drawn by the lower authorities on the said count in the hands of the assessee. Before parting, we may herein observe that as concluded by us hereinabove after necessary deliberations that no infirmity emerges arises from the claim of the assessee that it had opted A.Y 2007-08 as the initial assessment year for claim of deduction under Sec. 80-IA(4)(ii) and the same had wrongly been taken by the lower authorities as A.Y 2006-07, thus the observations of the A.O that the assessee alongwith its authorized representatives, CAs and tax auditors had intentionally provided misleading information to the department would not survive and are thus vacated. We herein conclude that as the assessee had opted A.Y 2007-08 as the initial assessment year for claim of deduction u/s 80IA(2), therefore, it would be entitled for 100% deduction from A.Y 2007-08 to A.Y 2011-12 and thereafter 30% from A.Y 2012-13 to A.Y 2016-17, subject to satisfaction of all other conditions.
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