ESOP Holding period to be reckoned from the date of exercise of option to buy shares and not from the earlier date of grant of options

ACIT Vs Pramod H. Lele (ITAT Mumbai)- The Stock Option Plan had granted only an ‘option to buy’ a specified number of shares in a specified time frame at a specified price, subject to the fulfilment of other conditions set out in the plan. There was no compulsion on the part of the assessee to acquire the shares. In other words, the Stock Option Plan only allowed the assessee to get benefit from the increase in the market price of the shares between the date of grant and the date of sale of shares. Therefore, where only stock options were issued and stood in the name of employees a...