During the year under consideration, the assessee company had made a payment of 1,09,35,108/- to Google Ireland Ltd. and the said amount was claimed as ‘advertisement expenditure’. While making the said payment, no tax at source was deducted by the assessee on the ground that the amount paid to Google Ireland Ltd. constituted business profits of the said company and since the said company did not have a permanent establishment (PE) in India, the amount paid was not chargeable to tax in India.
It is a fact that assessee has not booked the lease rentals as noted by the AO but on the reason that the assessee being NBFC is following the guidelines issued by RBI and guidelines states that once the party has become a defaulter for at least twelve months that party can be declared as NPA and no income on that part can be booked from the source after failure to get any income.
USCIB believes that the proposed guidelines are too vague to provide certainty to business investors. For example, an important part of certainty is respecting the obligations imposed by double taxation agreements between treaty partners. Treaty obligations should generally not be overridden by GAAR provisions. If India chooses to override a treaty obligation pursuant to Indian law, we believe that the scope of the override should be both narrow and clear. Use of the GAAR provisions to deny treaty benefits in a broad, discretionary manner would be fundamentally inconsistent with the specific limitation on benefits and beneficial ownership provisions of Articles 10 (Dividends), 11 (Interest), 12 (Royalties), and 24 (Limitation on Benefits) of India’s Treaty with the United States and other countries. We believe that the application of the GAAR rules in this manner would constitute an impermissible unilateral amendment of the United States-Indian Treaty.
The provision made for advance tax of Rs.23,50, 000/- debited in the P&L account not added back to income is bonafide mistake. Assessee paid advance tax in the month of March only. It is the first time that provision was debited in P&L account. Had there been any intention to file inaccurate particulars then the assessee could not have paid the advance tax in the last month of assessment year. The assessee concern is a firm which is not having expert chartered accountants at its payroll. Further, this was the first year in which the provision for taxation was debited to the P&L account.
The assessee’s claim of exemption u/s 54 is devoid of merits as the concept of mutuality has not been extended to the assessee besides the constructed houses or the properties of the respective members cannot be deemed to be purchased or construction of the houses belonging to the society. In view thereof, the claim u/s 54 has been rightly denied by AO and CIT(A).
