Sunder Deep Education Society vs. ACIT In the Income Tax Appellate Tribunal Delhi Bench ‘ G’ New Delhi Before Rajpal Yadav (J. M.) and T. S. Kapoor (A. M.) ITA No. 2428/Del/2011 Assessment Year: 2007-08. Decided on 6th December, 2013 Counsel for Assessee / Revenue: Rakesh Gupta / N. Srivastava

Facts
The assessee is registered under the Societies Registration Act, 1860 and u/s. 12AA of the Income tax Act, 1961. It also enjoys exemption u/s. 80G. The assessee runs educational institutions conducting various professional courses. In respect of the voluntary contribution aggregating to Rs. 1.97 crore received during the year, the assessee was not able to produce the donors when summoned by the AO who, as claimed by the assessee, had made the said donations. Therefore, the AO held that the same were anonymous and unexplained cash credit and added the said amount as the assessee’s total income as per section 115BBC and section 68.

Before the CIT(A) the assessee submitted the name and address of the persons who had made donations alongwith other particulars prescribed by the Act. The CIT(A) agreed that the donations could not be treated as ‘anonymous’. However, according to him, since the assessee could not prove the donations amount of Rs. 1.97 crore the same was treated as unaccounted income by him and brought to tax u/s. 11(4) read with section 68/69/69C. Before the tribunal, the revenue did not challenge the CIT(A)’s finding that the donations were not anonymous but contended that as held by the CIT(A), the same were taxable u/s. 68 and 69 as income from other sources and the benefit of section 11 and 12 would not be available to the assessee.

Held
The tribunal referred to the decision of the Delhi tribunal in the case of Shri Vivekanand Education & Welfare Society (ITA No. 2592 / Del / 2012) which was based on the decision of the Delhi high court in the case of DIT(Exem) vs. Keshav Social & Charitable Trust (278 ITR 152) where the Court observed that the fact that complete list of donors was not filed or that the donors were not produced, does not necessariiy lead to the inference that the assesse was trying to introduce un-accounted money by way of donation receipts. The Court further observed that as the assesse had disclosed the donation as income, the provisions of section 68 cannot be applied. Applying the ratio, the tribunal held that the said receipts of Rs. 1.97 crore would be governed by the provisions of sections 11 and 12 of the Act and if 85% thereof is applied towards the objects of the trust, then the income assessable would be nil.