Dear Sir,
Re:
Tax Laws & Ease of Doing Business in India
The Income-tax Act, 1961 has undergone thousands of Amendments since its inception. The Finance Act, 2023 has carried out more than 125 amendments. This has been the general trend for the last several decades. As a result of frequent amendments, many tax provisions have become too difficult to comprehend, understand, interpret and implement/ administer.
Also, the tax provisions have become very complex and unfathomable even to the best brains in the Legal Profession. This is evident from the fact that the judicial verdicts by various High Courts do not interpret the provisions in the same manner as the other High Courts have done. Consequently, decisions rendered even by the High Courts are distinguished or just reversed/overruled by a larger Bench or by the Apex Court. The taxpayers and their tax advisors are often at their wit’s end as to which judicial pronouncement represents the correct interpretation of the law to be relied upon as a guide for future course of action more so when the decision of the jurisdictional court is against the assessee and the decision of the non-jurisdictional court is in favour.
Many times, an amendment, instead of simplifying the existing complexity unintentionally adds to the complexities/ambiguities. Section 10(23C) is one of many such lengthy and very complex tax provisions.
Widespread litigation is evidence of the
