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Case lawNotifications2020 › Notification No 38/2020 [F. No. 370142/15/2020-TPL] / GSR 415(E)
Notification 26 June 2020

Notification No 38/2020 [F. No. 370142/15/2020-TPL] / GSR 415(E)

(Central Board of Direct Taxes)

What this is

Notification No 38/2020 [F. No. 370142/15/2020-TPL] / GSR 415(E) was published on 26 June 2020. Its subject is (Central Board of Direct Taxes).

This amends the Income-tax Rules. What it changes is the Rules, not the Act — and a rule can never take away what the section gives.

What it does

The Income-tax (13th Amendment) Rules, 2020 curtail two exemptions for an employee who has exercised the option under sub-section (5) of section 115BAC. A new sub-rule (3) is inserted in rule 2BB providing that, notwithstanding sub-rules (1) and (2), such an employee is entitled to exemption only in respect of the allowances in sub-clauses (a) to (c) of sub-rule (1) and the allowance at serial number 11 of the Table below sub-rule (2), to the extent and subject to the conditions specified there. In rule 3, in clause (iii) of sub-rule (7), a further proviso is inserted so that the exemption in the first proviso for free food and non-alcoholic beverage provided by the employer through paid vouchers does not apply to such an employee.

Who it reaches

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 ActNow
s.115BACs.202
s.295s.533

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.

ए ए
MINISTRY OF FINANCE
(Department of Revenue)
(CENTRAL BOARD OF DIRECT TAXES)
NOTIFICATION
New Delhi, the 26th June, 2020
INCOME-TAX
G.S.R. 415(E).—In exercise of the powers conferred by sub-section (2) of section 115BAC read with section 295 of the Income-tax Act, 1961 (43 of 1961), the Central Board of Direct Taxes hereby makes the following rules further to amend the Income-tax Rules,1962, namely:‒
1. Short title and commencement: - (1) These rules may be called the Income-tax (13th Amendment) Rules, 2020.
(2) They shall come into force from the 1st day of April, 2021 and shall accordingly apply in relation to the assessment year 2021-22 and subsequent assessment years.
2. In the Income-tax Rules, 1962,-
(a) in rule 2BB, after sub-rule (2), the following sub-rule shall be inserted, namely:—
"(3) Notwithstanding anything contained in sub-rule (1) and (2), an employee, being an assessee, who has exercised option under sub-section (5) of section 115BAC shall be entitled to exemption only in respect of the allowances mentioned in sub-clauses (a) to (c) of sub-rule (1) and at serial no.11 of the Table below sub-rule (2) to the extent and subject to the conditions, if any, specified therein.";
(b) in rule 3, in sub-rule (7), in clause (iii), after the proviso, the following proviso shall be inserted, namely:—
[भाग II—खण् ड 3(i)] भारत का रािपत्र : असाधारण 3
"Provided further that the exemption provided in the first proviso in respect of free food and nonalcoholic beverage provided by such employer through paid voucher shall not apply to an employee, being an assessee, who has exercised option under sub-section (5) of section 115BAC.".
[Notification No. 38/2020/F. No.370142/15/2020-TPL]
GUDRUN NEHAR, Director (Tax Policy and Legislation)
Note: The principal rules were published in the Gazette of India, Extraordinary, Part-II, Section-3, Sub-section (ii) vide number S.O. 969 (E), dated the 26th March, 1962 and last amended by the Income-tax (12th Amendment) Rules, 2020, vide notification number G.S.R. 338 (E) dated 29.5.2020
Uploaded by Dte. of Printing at Government of India Press, Ring Road, Mayapuri, New Delhi-110064
and Published by the Controller of Publications, Delhi-110054.

What it changes

The rule numbers are the 1962 Rules’ own, as the notification names them. The right-hand column is the department’s own mapping into the Income-tax Rules, 2026, which renumbered nearly everything.
Rule of the 1962 RulesNow, in the 2026 Rules
Rule 2BBrule 280
Rule 3rule 15

From when

1 April 2021.

What to watch

Where you meet it

In the salary computation and the perquisite valuation for an employee under the concessional regime, in tax deducted at source under section 192, and in the salary head of the return of income.

What it names

Rules it names. Rule 2BB, 3 of the Income-tax Rules, 1962. The 1962 Rules were replaced by the Income-tax Rules, 2026, which renumbered nearly everything: a rule number quoted here almost never means the same rule today.

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. 40/2020 [F. No.370149/143/2019-TPL] / GSR 421(E)  ·  Notification No. 36/2020 [F.No. 300196/38/2017-ITA-I] / SO 2042(E) →

What a notification is. A notification is made under a power the Act itself gives, and within that power it is law — unlike a circular, which only binds the department. Its reach is the reach of the enabling provision and no wider, and the date it carries decides from when it works.

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