Plea to Treat Heart as ‘Plant’ for Tax Deduction Rejected by SC as Infructuous

Shanti Bhushan Vs CIT (Supreme Court of India) A prolonged legal battle initiated by eminent late lawyer Shanti Bhushan, who sought to claim the expenses for his coronary bypass surgery as a tax-deductible business expenditure, concluded in the Supreme Court after his demise. The case, which travelled through various judicial levels, centred on the novel legal question of whether a human organ, specifically the heart, could be considered a ‘plant’ under the Income Tax Act, 1961, and if its repair could be claimed as a business expense. The matter was finally disposed of by the Supr...