Jwala Mahila Samiti Vs CIT- Exemption (ITAT Indore)
80G Rejection Set Aside: ITAT Indore Remands Matter—Paper-Bag Activity Held Not Automatically ‘Business’
Assessee, Jwala Mahila Samiti, a women-led charitable society registered since 2014, filed an appeal against the order of CIT(Exemption), Bhopal rejecting its Form 10AB application for final 80G registration & cancelling its earlier provisional 80G approval granted in 2021.
There was a delay of 279/280 days in filing the appeal. The society explained the delay through an affidavit stating that the impugned order could not be accessed by the earlier consultant & was discovered only when a new counsel was appointed. Holding that the delay was neither deliberate nor intentional, the Tribunal condoned the delay.
On merits, the assessee demonstrated that it conducts self-defence programmes & vocational training for women, including training them to make newspaper/paper bags from donated newspapers. The sale of these bags was argued to be incidental to women-empowerment activities, not a commercial business. Profits are used to support needy women.
CIT(E) had rejected the 80G application on the ground that sales constituted 65–99% of total receipts, treating the activity as business violating the proviso to section 2(15), & further held that the assessee did not respond to the second show-cause notice.
