Taxpayer Must Substantiate Form 26AS Or Form 16 So As To Claim Credit Over TDS: Mumbai ITAT

While remanding the case back for re-adjudication, the Mumbai ITAT held that the prima facie onus would be upon the Assessee to substantiate its claim of non-granting of TDS credit, by providing relevant documents, such as an appointment letter, salary slips or Form No.16 or bank statements, or any other corroborative evidence/ documents.

The Bench of the ITAT comprising of Narender Kumar Choudhry (Judicial Member) and S. Rifaur Rahman (Accountant Member) observed that “the Assessee by filing TDS working which is though initiated by somebody but the same is neither on proper letter head nor there is a name of the person who signed such document and even otherwise, the Assessee has also failed to file any document, wherefrom it can be reflected that the Assessee has received any particular amount of salary on which TDS has been deducted and therefore, in absence of relevant documents, the Commissioner correctly held that the AO has not made any mistake in non-granting of credit of TDS, since, the Assessee did not furnish any salary slip or Form No.16.” (Para 6.1)

As per the brief facts of the case, the Assessee had declared its total income of Rs. 42,40,705/- by filing its return of income. The breakup of the income earned by the Assessee is - Income from Salary – Rs.41,23,173/-, Bank interest – 1,17,532/-. The Assessee also claimed TDS amounting to Rs.10,45,439/- was deducted by employer from salary u/s.192 which was not allowed by the AO mainly on the ground that the employer of the Assessee has not reflected the TDS in Form No.26AS.

The CIT also affirmed the addition made by the AO by stating that “the TDS amount of Rs.10,45,439/- has not deposited by the employer to the Government Treasury, though the amount was deducted from the Assessee's salary income, the Assessee also did not furnish any salary slips or Form No.16 and the amount has not been deposited in the Government Treasury.”

The Bench noted that the Assessee mainly claimed that employer of Assessee not provided Form No.16.

The Bench observed that employer of the Assessee is also a regular defaulter and, in another incidence/case of another employee has also not deposited the TDS amount deducted u/s.192, which resulted into filing a case which went up to the Hon'ble Bench of the Tribunal at Pune.

The Bench further observed while referring to the case of Chandrashekhar Sadashiv Potphode v. DCIT in ITA No.508 & 509/Pun/2022 that the Tribunal granted the relief by allowing the TDS credit mainly on the reason that the only option to the Revenue is to recover the TDS amount not deposited by the employer who has deducted TDS and not from the Assessee as per provisions of Sec.205.

The Bench stated that Assessee is required to discharge its primary onus by producing relevant documents, then only, can claim the right in its right perspective.

Therefore, on finding absence of relevant documents, the ITAT allowed assessee's appeal for statistical purposes.

Counsel for Appellant/Taxpayer: Shashank Mehta

Counsel for Respondent/Department: Manoj Kumar Sinha

Case Title: Shri Ajit Chandrashekar Dighe verses DCIT

Case Number: ITA No.3335/Mum/2023

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