INCOME TAX OFFICER (EXEMPTION), GHAZIABAD V. VEER KUNWAR SINGH SHODH SANSTHAN, NOIDA

ITA 3999/DEL/2025

AI Insights

The case involves the Income Tax Officer appealing against the order of the CIT(A) which had provided partial relief to the assessee, Veer Kunwar Singh Shodh Sansthan, a public charitable trust. The trust was assessed for A.Y. 2018-19, where the Assessing Officer added Rs. 2,99,01,439 to the income, which included an opening balance of Rs. 2,92,17,939 in the building fund and corpus donations of Rs. 6,83,500. The CIT(A) deleted the addition related to the building fund but upheld the addition of Rs. 3,00,000 from the corpus donations due to lack of adequate documentation. The Tribunal's decision affirmed the CIT(A)'s findings, leading to the dismissal of the Revenue's appeal.

• Counselvise Citation: [2026] 140 COUNSELVISE.COM (IT) 833960 (ITAT-DELHI)
• Duration Of Justice: 7 month(s) 15 day(s)
• Appeal Type: Income Tax Appeal
• Pronouncement Date: 04-02-2026
• Appeal Filed By: Department
• Order Result: Dismissed
• Bench Allotted: G
• Assessment Year: 2018-2019
• Appeal Filed On: 19-06-2025
• Laws Referred To: Income-tax Act, 1961
• Result in Favour of: Assessee
• Court: TRIBUNAL
• Department Lawyers: MANISH GUPTA
• Assessee Lawyers: ANAND VAJPAI
• Keywords: Charitable institution
• Section: 12A

Judgement Text

"Page 1 of 6 IN THE INCOME TAX APPELLATE TRIBUNAL, DELHI ‘G’ BENCH, NEW DELHI BEFORE MS. MADHUMITA ROY, JUDICIAL MEMBER, AND SHRI NAVEEN CHANDRA, ACCOUNTANT MEMBER ITA No. 3999/DEL/2025 [A.Y. 2018-19] Income tax Officer Vs. Veer Kunwar Singh Shodh [Exemption] Sansthan, B-23-C, Sector–62 New Delhi Noida, Uttar Pradesh PAN – AAATV 6962 A (Applicant) (Respondent) Assessee By : Shri Anand Vajpai, Adv Shri Tarun Chauhan, CA Department By : Shri Manish Gupta, Sr. DR Date of Hearing : 14.01.2026 Date of Pronouncement : 04.02.2026 ORDER PER NAVEEN CHANDRA:- This appeal by the Revenue is preferred against the order of the ld. CIT(A)-25, New Delhi dated 07.04.2025 pertaining to A.Y 2018-19. 2. Briefly stated, the facts of the case are that the assessee M/s. Veer Kunwar Singh Shodh Sansthan is a public charitable trust registered under section 12A of the Income-tax Act, 1961 [the Act, for short]. This Printed from counselvise.com ITA No.3999/DEL/2025 ITO Vs.Veer Kunwar Singh Shodh Sansthan Page 2 of 6 trust was created for the relief of poor and to promote science art and culture. 3. The assessee e-filed the original return on 28.10.2018 for A.Y 2018-19 declaring total taxable income of Rs. NIL. The case was selected for complete scrutiny through CASS and notice u/s 143(2) of the Act dated 23.09.2019 duly served upon the assessee. The AO from the perusal of the Balance Sheet noticed that on the liability side of Balance Sheet in Building Fund, the assessee has shown Rs.2,92,17,939.56/- as Opening Balance and corpus donation of Rs.6,83,500/-. The AO not being satisfied with the response, the AO added an amount of Rs. 2,92,17,939/- and Rs.6,83,500/- u/s 143(3). 4. Aggrieved, the assessee went in appeal before the ld. CIT(A) who after considering the facts and submissions of the assessee, gave partial relief. 5. Aggrieved by the order of the ld. CIT(A), the Revenue is in appeal before us. 6. Before us, the ld. DR relied on the orders of the Assessing Officer. 7. Per contra, the ld. counsel for the assessee vehemently argued that the opening balance of Rs. 2.99 crores was being accumulated since 2007. It is also stated that as on 01.04.2018, the building fund has opening balance of Rs. 2,92,17,939/-. Since the amount pertains to Printed from counselvise.com ITA No.3999/DEL/2025 ITO Vs.Veer Kunwar Singh Shodh Sansthan Page 3 of 6 previous years, it is submitted that the same cannot be added during the year. 8. We have heard the rival submissions and have perused the relevant material on record. We find that the ld. CIT(A) has given a categorical finding that the building fund had opening balance of Rs. 2,92,17,939/- as on 01.04.2018. On these facts, the ld CIT(A) came to hold as under: “It is also the claim of the appellant that corpus donations received by Trust registered u/s. 12A/12AA of the Act are exempt from taxation and these corpus donations received by the appellant being capital in nature cannot be regarded as its income. 5.1.4 It is seen that the Building Fund has accumulated in the books of the appellant over the past more than 10 years for which year- wise accretion has been given by the appellant which was also filed before the AO. It has been mentioned by the appellant that more than 95% of its donations were received through account payee cheques and for AYs 2006-07 and 2007-08, detailed scrutiny was carried out in its case by ACIT, Noida. By submitting these details the primary onus which was casted upon the appellant has been discharged by it. The fault lies with the AO in not taking into account these submissions filed before him. Further, according to the AO, and as evident from the Balance Sheet of the appellant as at 31.03.2018, out of total addition made of Rs. 2,99,01,439/-, sum of Rs. 2,92,17,939/- was opening balance under the head Building Fund as at 01.04.2018. This would mean that this fund was never received by the appellant during the concerned A.Y. In Printed from counselvise.com ITA No.3999/DEL/2025 ITO Vs.Veer Kunwar Singh Shodh Sansthan Page 4 of 6 this scenario, addition to the extent of Rs. 2,92,17,939/- could not be made in the hands of the appellant by the AO. Further, for receiving corpus donation amounting to Rs. 6,83,500/- during the concerned AY, the appellant has submitted that out of the said sum, Rs. 3,83,500/- was received in cheque from 3 different individuals whose PANs have also been provided. However, for the remaining sum of Rs. 3,00,000/- the appellant has only submitted names of 22 individuals from whom cash ranging between Rs. 10,000/- to Rs. 15000/- have been received towards corpus donation. Neither the complete address nor any account confirmation from any of them has been filed by the appellant. Therefore, with respect to sum of Rs. 3,00,000/-, it is found that the appellant has failed to discharge its primary onus of proving the source and genuineness of the same. Hence to the extent of Rs. 3,00,000/- the addition made by the AO is tenable and for the balance sum of Rs. 2,96,01,439/-, the addition made is to be deleted. Accordingly, the grounds of appeal raised by the appellant are partly allowed.” 9. In the above factual matrix of the instant case, we are, therefore, of the considered view that since the building fund has been accumulated over a period of time and did not pertain to the AY in question, hence the Assessing Officer fell in error in adding the same in A.Y 2018-19. We also find that the Assessing Officer has not made any investigation with regard to building fund accumulation and hence there Printed from counselvise.com ITA No.3999/DEL/2025 ITO Vs.Veer Kunwar Singh Shodh Sansthan Page 5 of 6 was no reason for him to make the addition. We, therefore, find no reason to interfere with the order of the Assessing Officer. Ground 1 is dismissed. 10. With respect to corpus donation, the ld. CIT(A) restricted the addition to Rs. 3 lakhs out of Rs. 6,83,500/- on account of the fact that the assessee received the same in cash and could not furnish any complete address nor confirmation from the donors. We find no reason to interfere with the decision of the ld. CIT(A). Ground 2 stands dismissed. 11. In the result, the captioned appeal of the Revenue in ITA No. 3999/DEL/2025 stands dismissed. The order is pronounced in the open court on 04.02.2026. Sd/- Sd/- [MADHUMITA ROY] [NAVEEN CHANDRA] JUDICIAL MEMBER ACCOUNTANT MEMBER Dated: 4th February, 2026. VL/ Copy forwarded to: 1. Appellant 2. Respondent 3. CIT 4. CIT(A) Asst. Registrar, 5. DR ITAT, New Delhi Printed from counselvise.com "