Mohd. Saeed Vs ITO (ITAT Jaipur)
Extra Zero, Extra Tax – Revenue Cannot Profit from Mistakes: ITAT Protects Salaried Employee from Typo- Typo Turns ₹3.1 Lakh into ₹31 Lakh – Tribunal Rescues Salaried Employee from Clerical Error.
Jaipur ITAT has come to the rescue of a salaried employee who faced a huge tax demand due to a simple typographical error in his return.
Assessee is a salaried person and drawing salary from M/s. K.D.K. Software’s India Pvt Ltd. The salary of the assessee is credited in his bank account. During the year under consideration, the assessee had earned salary of Rs.3,10,691/- but due to typographical error, the amount was mentioned in the return of income as Rs.31,06,910/- instead of Rs.3,10,691/-. This mistake, arising out of an extra zero, was processed by CPC u/s 143(1), creating a tax liability far beyond his real earnings.
When assessee sought rectification u/s 154, CPC rejected the request & the jurisdictional AO also refused, citing non-availability of CPC records. His appeal before CIT(A) was dismissed purely on grounds of delay of 563 days, without addressing the merits of the case. Left with no choice, he approached the ITAT. Assessee submitted that his Form 16, bank statements & employer’s certificate clearly reflected a salary of only ₹3.1 lakh & no such inflated salary had ever been received by him in the past or subsequent years. He stressed that tax cannot be collected merely on account of a clerical slip, citing Article 265 of the Constitution which mandates that no tax shall be levied or collected except by authority of law.
