Bank of India Vs ACIT (ITAT Mumbai)
The Mumbai Bench of the Income Tax Appellate Tribunal decided cross-appeals filed by Bank of India and the Revenue concerning assessment years 2016-17 and 2018-19. The appeals arose from orders dated 28/02/2023 passed under section 250 of the Income-tax Act, 1961 by the CIT(A), National Faceless Appeal Centre, Delhi. The Tribunal considered the AY 2016-17 appeal as the lead case and applied its findings mutatis mutandis to AY 2018-19.
For AY 2016-17, the Tribunal deleted the disallowance under section 14A read with Rule 8D, relying on the Tribunal’s decision in the assessee’s own case and the judicial decisions concerning shares held as stock-in-trade. It dismissed the assessee’s challenge to the disallowance of lease-premium amortisation, while restoring the country-risk provision issue to the Assessing Officer for de novo adjudication. The Tribunal also restored the foreign-tax-credit issue for verification and directions in accordance with the applicable double taxation avoidance agreements.
On bad debts, the Tribunal held that the provision for bad and doubtful debts account under section 36(1)(viia) had no credit balance as on 01/04/2015 and consequently deleted the addition made under section 36(1)(vii). The Tribunal further held, following the Special Bench decision in Union Bank of India vs. DCIT, that section 115JB was not applicable to the assessee bank, rendering the consequential grounds infructuous.
