2021 (8) TMI 563 - AT - Income Tax

Addition in respect of employees contribution to ESI & PF - delayed deposits of contributions - HELD THAT:- As noted that the assessee has deposited the employees’s contribution towards ESI and PF well before the due date of filing of return of income u/s 139(1) and the last of such deposits were made on 16.04.2019 whereas due date of filing the return for the impugned assessment year 2019-20 was 31.10.2019 and the return of income was also filed on the said date. Admittedly and undisputedly, the employees’s contribution to ESI and PF which have been collected by the assessee from its employees have thus been deposited well before the due date of filing of return of income u/s 139(1) of the Act.

The issue is no more res integra in light of series of decisions rendered by the Hon’ble Rajasthan High Court starting from CIT vs. State Bank of Bikaner & Jaipur [2014 (5) TMI 222 - RAJASTHAN HIGH COURT] and subsequent decisions. Also see JAIPUR VIDYUT VITRAN NIGAM LTD AND RAJASTHAN RAJYA VIDYUT UTPADAN NIGAM LTD [2014 (1) TMI 1085 - RAJASTHAN HIGH COURT] as been consistently held that where the PF and ESI dues are paid after the due date under the respective statues but before filing of the return of income under section 139(1), the same cannot be disallowed under section 43B read with section 36(1)(va) of the Act.

Thus addition by way of adjustment while processing the return of income u/s 143(1) so made by the CPC towards the delayed deposit of the employees’s contribution towards ESI and PF though paid well before the due date of filing of return of income u/s 139(1) of the Act is hereby directed to be deleted as the same cannot be disallowed under section 43B read with section 36(1)(va) - Decided in favour of assessee.