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2025 (1) TMI 1501 - HC - Income TaxPIL - online utility provided by the respondents denied the assessees benefit of claiming a rebate u/s 87A of the Income-tax Act for the assessment year 2024-25 while filing online return against tax computed under various sections of Chapter XII of the Act - seeking direction or order directing the Respondents to allow assesses to file a manual return of income for claiming rebate Whether respondents are justified in modifying their utility whereby an assessee is debarred at the threshold from making a rebate claim under Section 87A while uploading his return of income online? - HELD THAT - As in the course of the hearing our attention was drawn to the subject matter of Writ Petition in the case of Lupin Ltd. 2024 (3) TMI 1406 - BOMBAY HIGH COURT wherein the assessee was prevented from making the claim of deduction based on the Supreme Court decision since electronic mode of filing the return was not permitting the assessee to do so. On a writ petition being filed and on a direction by this Court a manual return was permitted to be filed for making the said claim. We were informed that while processing the manual return the claim of the assessee was accepted. We are referring to this decision for the limited purpose to bring our point in support of our analysis that certainly the utility cannot be designed to prevent an assessee from making a claim which subsequently by adjudication and appeal process may be found to be correct. As in the case of Tata Sons Pvt. Ltd. 2024 (3) TMI 1405 - BOMBAY HIGH COURT also permitted the assessee to file paper return which came to be processed and thereafter an appeal against such processing was filed by the assessee. This decision is also relied upon to the limited extent that the online system did not provide to make a claim which was permitted by paper return and processed accordingly. Therefore it is not that an assessee can be debarred from making a claim in the return of income whether online or manual. If any such claim is made the revenue would certainly be free to examine the same as per the provisions of the Act. Both the revenue and the assessee have remedies under the Act for testing the validity of such a claim. We however refrain from expressing any views on whether the submissions made by the learned senior counsel for the petitioners or the learned ASG are correct since that would be something which has to be examined by the quasi-judicial authorities under the Act in the first instance and not by a writ court in its exercise of extraordinary jurisdiction. We agree with the learned ASG that unless there is a demand for justice which has been rejected or a failure on the part of the revenue to exercise its duty under the Act such a writ as prayed for in prayer clause (c) cannot be granted. We also agree with the learned ASG that unless there is some concrete instance the Court should grant no relief in such broad and general terms. Such reliefs in general terms are typically not to be granted because the ramifications would be unclear. For the present we do not propose to consider relief in terms of the prayer clause (c) of the petition by leaving the question open. Order - Hon ble Court be pleased to issue a writ of mandamus or a writ in the nature of mandamus or any other appropriate writ direction or order directing the Respondents to modify the utilities for filing of the return of income u/s 139 of the Act immediately thereby allowing assessees to make a claim of rebate u/s 87A of the Act read with the proviso to section 87A in their return of income for the AY 2024-25 and subsequent years including revised returns to be filed under section 139 (5) of the Act. The issue of adjudication of eligibility of a claim under Section 87A is left to the authorities under the Act while processing the returns filed by the assessees.
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