Circular No. 13/2019 — Government of India Ministry of Finance Department of Revenue Central Board of Direct Taxe

What this is

Circular No. 13/2019 was issued by the Central Board of Direct Taxes on 24 June 2019. Its subject is Government of India Ministry of Finance Department of Revenue Central Board of Direct Taxes CIRCULAR No. 13/2019 North Block, New Delhi June 2019.

This grants an exemption or a relief under a provision that allows one. Read the conditions attached: an exemption notification is construed strictly, and a condition missed is the exemption lost.

What it does

Confirms that the service element and the disability element of a disability pension granted to armed forces personnel invalided from service on account of a bodily disability attributable to or aggravated by that service are exempt from tax. The route is section 297(2)(c): a notification under section 60 or section 60A of the Indian Income-tax Act, 1922 that was in force immediately before the 1961 Act commenced continues in force to the extent the 1961 Act makes no provision, and Notification No. 878-F dated 21 March 1922 exempted pensions granted to members of the naval, military or air forces invalided on account of such bodily disability.

Why it was issued

The exemption rests on a 1922 notification carried forward by a saving provision, and its continued operation needed to be stated plainly.

Who it reaches

Armed forces personnel invalided out of service on account of disability
Pension disbursing offices deducting tax at source on pension
Ex-servicemen assessed on pension received

The provisions it speaks to

Left, the provision of the Income-tax Act, 1961 as the instrument itself names it. Right, the section of the Income-tax Act, 2025 that the department’s own concordance maps it to — which is where the same ground is now covered.

Under the 1961 Act	Now
s.2	s.2, s.346, s.355
s.60	s.96
s.60A	no counterpart recorded
s.297	s.536

The instrument, as the Board published it

The department publishes this one only as a PDF, so the words below were read out of that PDF by machine. That reading can carry its own mistakes — a misread number, a broken line. Check the signed document before you rely on a figure in it. The reading also stopped short of the end of the document: what is below is the opening, not the whole of it.

Government of India Ministry of Finance Department of Revenue Central Board of Direct Taxes CIRCULAR No. 13/2019 North Block, New Delhi June 2019

Subject: Exemption of service element and disability element of disability pension granted to disabled personnel of armed forces who have been invalided on account of disability attributable to or aggravated by such service

Under the existing provisions of clause (c) of sub-section 2 of section 297 of the Income-tax Act, 1961, any notification issued under sub-section (1) of section 60 or section 60A of the Indian Income-Tax Act, 1922 (now repealed) and in force immediately before the commencement of the Act shall continue to be in force to the extent to which no provision has been made under the Act. Previously, vide Notification no. 878-F dated 21.03.1922, it was ordered that "pensions granted to members of His Majesty's naval, military or air forces who have been invalided for naval, military or air force service on account of bodily disability attributable to or aggravated by such service would be exempt from tax."

What to watch

The exemption is tied to invalidment on account of a bodily disability attributable to or aggravated by service — that condition, not the mere fact of a disability element, is what carries it.
It covers both limbs of the pension, service element and disability element, so a deduction on the service element alone is wrong.
The exemption survives only to the extent the 1961 Act has made no provision on the point, which is how section 297(2)(c) is worded.

Where you meet it

In the pension disbursing bank's tax deduction on pension, in the Form 16 issued for it, and in an intimation under section 143(1) where the exempt pension was picked up as taxable.

What it names

It mentions. Circular No. 13/2019

On the same provision

Other instruments in this library that name the same provision of the 1961 Act. They are not necessarily still operative, and a later one may have replaced an earlier one without saying so.

Notification No. 89/2026-CBDT [F. No. 164/1/2026-ITA-1] / SO 3936(E) — Ministry of Finance 17 July 2026
Notification No. 75/2026 [F. No. 275/18/2026-IT(B)] / SO 3610(E) : TDS Exemption on Ship Lease Payments to IFSC Units — 4 the Gazette of INDIA : Extraordinary [Part Ii—sec. 3(ii)] 3 July 2026
Notification No. 74/2026 [F. No. 275/16/2026-IT(B)] / SO 3609(E) : TDS Exemption on Aircraft Lease Payments to IFSC Units — 4 the Gazette of INDIA : Extraordinary [Part Ii—sec. 3(ii)] 3 July 2026
Notification No. 65/2025 [F. No. 300196/4/2019-ITA-I] / S.O. 2739(E) — Ministry of Finance 19 June 2025
Notification No. 56 /2025 [F.No.300164/4/2024-ITA-1] / SO 2576(E) — 2 the Gazette of INDIA : Extraordinary [Part Ii—sec. 3(ii)] 12 June 2025
Notification No. 52/2025 [F. No. 300164/5/2024-ITA-1] / SO 2447(E) — Ministry of Finance 30 May 2025

← Circular No. 14/2019 · Circular No. 11/2019 →

A circular binds the department, not you and not a court. The Board issues a circular to its own officers. An assessee may hold the department to a circular that helps him; the department cannot hold an assessee to one that hurts him, and the Tribunal and the courts decide the law for themselves.

Source: the Income Tax Department’s own published text — its page for this instrument.