Another High Court has taken the opposite view on the same point and no Supreme Court decision has resolved it. Which way it goes may depend on where your matter is. 18 entries in this library carry this status. Each note below says what was found and where it was checked.
High courts differ on the point this order decides, and the split has been established rather than assumed. Against the assessee: Bharat Construction Company v. ITO, Madhya Pradesh High Court, B.A. Iman J., 1 December 1998, (1999) 153 CTR (MP) 414 / [1999] 106 Taxman 460 (MP) — retrieved and read at indiankanoon.org/doc/709267/. The assessee there had not maintained account books and had declared income on an estimate basis; the Court held that 'the defaults contemplated by section 271A and section 271B are separate and distinct', that a person who fails to get his accounts audited under s.44AB is liable to penalty under s.271B, and dismissed the petition, holding the s.271B notice not barred by limitation under s.275(b). The question before that Court was limitation, so the proposition is its ratio on the question it was cited for rather than a full construction of s.271B — but it is squarely against the line this order follows. It was applied the same way by Rakesh Kumar Jha v. ITO, ITA No. 72/Ran/2022, ITAT Ranchi (indiankanoon.org/doc/166415541/), which quotes the same passage and upheld its own s.271B penalty; those were the two authorities the CIT(A) relied on below. For the assessee: Surajmal Parsuram Todi v. CIT (Gauhati), CIT v. Bisauli Tractors (Allahabad) and CIT v. S.K. Gupta & Co. (Allahabad) — the Allahabad judgment in Bisauli Tractors, on which this order chiefly rests, was separately retrieved and read in full and the passages quoted in this order match it. No search was made for any appeal against this Tribunal order or for later Tribunal decisions considering it, and a further Tribunal decision said to confirm both penalties for the same year, Saraswati Gupta v. ITO (ITAT Kolkata), was not retrieved.
The Delhi High Court in Yum Restaurants (India) P Ltd v ITO (13 January 2016), which the library already carries, held s.79 attracted where the shares of an Indian company moved between two subsidiaries of the same ultimate parent. The structures are not identical — here the transferee was wholly owned by the transferor itself — but the two decisions pull in opposite directions and a practitioner should present both. Whether either has been considered by the Supreme Court was not established. Both decisions construe s.79 as it stood before its substitution by the Finance Act 2019 with effect from 1 April 2020.
The conflict is recorded in the judgment itself: the Gujarat High Court in CIT v. Kiranbhai H. Shelat allowed 40 per cent of incentive bonus as expenses, and the Bombay High Court here respectfully disagreed with it, aligning itself with Madras, Punjab and Haryana, and a Karnataka Full Bench. I searched for a Supreme Court decision resolving the question and could not locate one; that is a failure of search, not a finding that none exists, and a later pass should look again. An exact-phrase check on the operative sentence shows the same passage appearing in CIT v. A.K. Ghosh (Madhya Pradesh, 5 May 2003) and Ambrish Jalswal v. Asst. CIT (Delhi, 30 June 2003), which indicates the ratio has been quoted by other High Courts; I did not read those judgments and do not certify how they treated it. Separately, the quantum in the judgment is spent, and the composition of s.16 has itself changed: under s.115BAC, the default regime from AY 2024-25, s.115BAC(2) withdraws clauses (ii) and (iii) of s.16 entirely, so only clause (ia) survives unless a valid option out of the default regime has been exercised. As to that clause: the s.16(i) standard deduction it refers to no longer exists, and the present s.16(ia) allows fifty thousand rupees or the amount of the salary whichever is less, substituted for forty thousand — the figure from AY 2019-20 — by Act No. 7 of 2019 with effect from 1 April 2020, that is from AY 2020-21, with a proviso, from AY 2025-26, reading seventy-five thousand rupees where income-tax is computed under s.115BAC(1A)(ii) — text read on the department's own section pages at incometaxindia.gov.in/w/section-16-59 and /w/section-16-63, not on an indiankanoon act page.
The Calcutta High Court holds that s.185 read with s.184 is not mandatory where the instrument was produced before the assessment was completed. The Kerala High Court in M/s Bhaskar & Co v. CIT, I.T.A. Nos. 454 and 457 of 2009, decided 15 September 2009, holds that production of the certified copy of the instrument of partnership is mandatory for assessment in the status of a firm, and expressly declined to decide whether production after the return but before completion of the assessment is sufficient compliance. No Supreme Court decision resolving the difference was located. Section 184 and s.185 were not affected by the Finance Act 2021 partnership amendments.
A full later-treatment check was not run and no Supreme Court proceeding was traced. What was actually verified: the same High Court followed this decision in CIT v. Master Sukhwant Singh, (2005) 196 CTR (P&H) 122, decided 7 February 2005 by N.K. Sud J and Satish Kumar Mittal J, which was read in full at https://indiankanoon.org/doc/1441024/?type=print and answered the identical question on instalment allotment in favour of the assessee. There is a real divergence. The Madras High Court in K. Govinda Bhatt v. CIT [1999] 235 ITR 528, decided 4 March 1997, read at https://indiankanoon.org/doc/1351518/?type=print, answered the converse question in the negative and against the assessee, holding that 'An agreement to pay the balance of consideration due by the purchaser does not in truth give rise to a loan' and that unpaid purchase money secured by mortgage is not capital borrowed for s.24(1)(vi). That decision was cited for the Revenue in the present case and the Punjab and Haryana High Court did not deal with it. The Punjab and Haryana line was followed by the same Court in CIT v. Master Sukhwant Singh (7 February 2005).
The conflict is on the face of this judgment: the Calcutta High Court expressly declined to follow the Delhi High Court in CIT v. Engineers India Ltd., [2015] 373 ITR 377, and followed the Bombay High Court in Stockholding Corporation of India v. N.C. Tewari, (2015) 373 ITR 282. Neither of those two judgments was read for this entry, so their precise holdings are taken from this judgment's account of them. Whether the Supreme Court has since resolved the conflict was not checked, and no search of the Supreme Court's records for a special leave petition was made. Separately, note the statutory change: s.244A(1)(aa) was inserted by the Finance Act 2016 with effect from 1 June 2016 and deals expressly with a refund out of tax paid under s.140A. Clause (aa) has been read: it calculates interest on a refund out of tax paid under s.140A at one-half per cent per month from the date of furnishing of the return of income or the date of payment of the tax, whichever is later, to the date the refund is granted. That displaces this judgment's 'date of payment' starting point for any period governed by clause (aa), wherever the tax was paid before the return was furnished. The entitlement to interest on a s.140A refund, which is what this judgment establishes, survives — clause (aa) enacts it.
The point has survived a departmental attack in this Court: the review application was dismissed on 3 October 2023 and no further challenge was traced. Nothing overruling or doubting the orders was found, and no Supreme Court treatment was located. There is, however, a contrary view in another High Court on the credit limb. In Mridul Raj Kunnon v. CIT [2025] 174 taxmann.com 164 (Kerala), 3 April 2025, Gopinath P. J. recorded disagreement with Sanjay Sudan, the decision this writ order follows, to the extent it holds that credit becomes available on deduction where the deductor has not paid the amount over, holding instead that s.199 permits credit only to the extent of receipt while s.205 bars only recovery. That Court refused a direction to cancel the demands and left the revenue to proceed against the deductor under s.201, credit to follow any recovery.
A reportable Division Bench decision of July 2024. The judgment itself records that the Department's special leave petition against the Telangana High Court's decision on the same point, SLP (Civil) Diary No. 2041/2024, was pending with notice issued, and that the Calcutta High Court has taken a contrary view; the outcome of those proceedings was not checked.
Followed by the Punjab and Haryana High Court in Jatinder Singh Bhangu (July 2024), which also records that the Revenue's special leave petition against this judgment, SLP (Civil) Diary No. 2041/2024, was pending with notice issued, and that the Calcutta High Court has taken a contrary view in Triton Overseas. The outcome of the Supreme Court proceedings was not checked.
The Kerala High Court's reading, that production of the certified copy is mandatory, sits against the Calcutta High Court in CIT v. S.R. Batliboi & Associates, I.T.A. No. 190 of 2009, decided 24 February 2015, which held that s.185 read with s.184, although worded in emphatic terms, is not intended to be mandatory where the instrument was produced during the assessment. The difference is narrower than it first appears, because this Court expressly declined to decide whether production before completion of the assessment is sufficient compliance. No Supreme Court decision resolving the point was located. Section 184 and s.185 were not affected by the Finance Act 2021 partnership amendments.
The judgment itself follows the Calcutta High Court in CIT v. S.K. Tekriwal [2014] 46 taxmann.com 444 / 361 ITR 432, and affirms the Tribunal's order dated 10 May 2021 in IT Appeal No. 3838 (Delhi) of 2017. The full report carries no citator entry recording an SLP, a stay, a reversal or any doubting of the decision. Later application rests on the Ahmedabad Tribunal in Joshi Technologies International Inc. v. Asst. CIT (IT) (2024) 109 ITR 70 (Ahd)(Trib), which is recorded as following it and deleting a s.40(a)(ia) disallowance on the footing that short deduction is answered by s.201; that record comes from a digest's editorial note rather than from the Tribunal order itself, so treat the follower as reported rather than read. The point is not settled across High Courts: CIT v. PVS Memorial Hospital Ltd. (2016) 380 ITR 284 / 60 taxmann.com 69 (Ker)(HC) takes the contrary view on the same facts pattern of deduction under the wrong TDS head.
No later decision doubting or reversing this judgment was located, and no order on any special leave petition against it could be traced; the absence of a traced special leave petition is not the same as confirmation that none was filed. The one later Bombay High Court order that could be verified from a permitted primary source is PCIT-1, Thane v. Komal Kumarpal Shah (Income Tax Appeal No. 642 of 2025, decided 20 November 2025, neutral citation 2025:BHC-OS:21758-DB, M.S. Sonak and Advait M. Sethna JJ), where the Revenue's appeal in a penny-stock case was dismissed and the Court recorded that the Tribunal's order under appeal had referred to this judgment; the High Court there did not itself restate the ratio, so treat it as consistent later practice rather than as a fresh application of the principle. It sits on the taxpayer side of a genuine divide: the Calcutta High Court in PCIT v. Swati Bajaj (ITAT No. 6 of 2022, decided 14 June 2022) takes a markedly different approach on comparable material, and the Madras High Court has sustained additions in penny-stock appeals. That is a difference of principle between different High Courts on the same question, which is why this entry is labelled 'high courts differ'. Its force in your case depends heavily on the two facts that carried it - trades executed on the floor of the exchange, and a SEBI finding directed at the broker rather than at the assessee.
No later decision doubting or reversing this judgment was located, and no order on any special leave petition against it could be traced. But the High Courts do not speak with one voice on the question it decides. The Calcutta High Court in PCIT v. Swati Bajaj (14 June 2022), which this library already carries, upheld additions on a batch of penny-stock appeals on an approach that gives far greater weight to the Investigation Wing material and to preponderance of probabilities, and the Delhi High Court itself sustained an addition in a later Delhi appeal on a thinner record v. PCIT (29 July 2020) on a record where the assessee produced little beyond contract notes. Check which High Court's view binds your assessing officer and your Tribunal bench before relying on this decision as decisive.
Followed by name. In G Square Layout (P.) Ltd. v. Dy. CIT [2025] 179 taxmann.com 588 / (2026) 488 ITR 749 (Mad.), Crl. O.P. No. 22880 of 2025, decided 7 October 2025, the Madras High Court set this judgment out at length, recorded that it had 'attained finality', applied it to quash a s.276C(2) complaint against a company that had paid its admitted self-assessment tax only after a show cause notice, and added that the word 'wilful' is conspicuously absent from s.220 so that a default that is not wilful does not attract the penal provision. Taxmann's case review for that decision records this judgment as followed. Two qualifications. The later decision was given by N. Sathish Kumar J., the same judge who decided this case, so it is a considered restatement by the same mind rather than independent endorsement. And this judgment itself records an express disagreement with the contrary view of the Telangana High Court in Konark Refrigerator v. Dy. CIT, Crl. Petition No. 5964 of 2018 (para 24), so the point is not uniform across High Courts. No special leave petition against this judgment appears on the report.
Followed by another High Court. In Manjeet Singh Chawla v. Dy. CIT (TDS) [2025] 175 taxmann.com 778 (Karnataka), decided 2 June 2025 by S.R. Krishna Kumar J, this judgment was followed on the identical plan and the identical payment, the Court holding at para 7(vii) that its reasoning squarely applies. That Court also recorded at para 7(viii)(a), on the petitioner's submission, that this judgment was not challenged by the revenue and has attained finality and become binding on it. The point is not settled across High Courts. In Nishithkumar Mukeshkumar Mehta v. Dy. CIT (TDS) [2024] 165 taxmann.com 386 / [2025] 475 ITR 614 (Madras), 31 July 2024, Senthilkumar Ramamoorthy J held the same receipt taxable as a perquisite and said in terms at his para 40 that the opinion of the Delhi High Court in this case could not be endorsed. That judgment is under appeal before a Division Bench of the Madras High Court, as the Karnataka Court recorded at para 7(viii)(b) and (d).
Followed by a later Division Bench of the same Court. In Incredible Unique Buildcon (P.) Ltd. v. ITO [2023] 153 taxmann.com 179 (Delhi), 31 May 2023, Rajiv Shakdher and Girish Kathpalia JJ, this judgment was set out at length and followed, the Court holding that the revenue could neither recover the undeposited deduction from the deductee nor refuse credit for it; the revenue's review application against that order was dismissed on 3 October 2023, [2023] 155 taxmann.com 603 (Delhi). Note that Shakdher J presided in both. There is now a contrary view in another High Court. In Mridul Raj Kunnon v. CIT [2025] 174 taxmann.com 164 (Kerala), 3 April 2025, Gopinath P. J. recorded disagreement in terms with this judgment to the extent it holds that credit becomes available on deduction even where the deductor has not paid the amount over, holding that s.199 allows credit only to the extent of receipt and that the heading of s.205 shows it bars recovery from the assessee without mandating credit. That Court followed CIT v. Om Prakash Gattani [2001] 117 Taxman 549 / 242 ITR 638 (Gauhati) and the Bombay order in Aslam Checkar v. ITO, and left it to the department to proceed against the deductor under s.201, credit to follow any recovery.
The proposition this order rests on is contested at High Court level: the Gujarat High Court in CIT v. Neha Builders Pvt Ltd holds that income from property held as stock-in-trade is business income and not property income, while the Delhi High Court in Ansal Housing Finance & Leasing Co. Ltd. (354 ITR 180) holds that notional annual letting value on a builder's unsold flats is assessable under house property. The Mumbai benches have consistently followed the Gujarat line and did so here. Separately, the position for AY 2018-19 onwards is governed by section 23(5) as inserted by the Finance Act 2017 (nil annual value for one year from the end of the financial year of the completion certificate) and as extended to two years by the Finance Act 2019 from AY 2020-21, so the reasoning here speaks only to earlier years. I did not check whether the Revenue appealed this particular order to the Bombay High Court, and no later decision citing it was searched for.
The judgment itself records at para 42 that the Delhi High Court in CIT v. DLF Commercial Developers Ltd. has taken a view contrary to the Bombay line, so the conflict is on the face of the report and a practitioner must present both. A search of decisions citing this judgment found three Tribunal orders applying it - ITO v. Plaza Securities Ltd. (ITAT Mumbai, 15 June 2022), Bright Paints Pvt. Ltd. v. DCIT (ITAT Mumbai, 27 June 2025) and Raag Vihar Apartments Pvt. Ltd. v. DCIT (ITAT Delhi, 10 July 2026) - and none doubting it. I did not read those three orders in full and I could NOT establish whether the Revenue has taken this judgment to the Supreme Court; no special leave petition was located. The decision concerns AY 2009-10 and therefore the Explanation to s.73 as it stood before the Finance (No. 2) Act 2014 amendment.
There is no backlog: every authority here has been searched for later treatment — a decision overruling or doubting it, an amendment overtaking the provision it construes, an SLP, a circular changing the administrative position. Where the answer was found, the entry carries it with the page it was checked against. Where it was not, the entry sits under validity check could not be completed and its note records what was searched and which sources refused — because an upgrade to “still good law” needs a page that actually applies or follows the decision, and finding nothing bad is not the same thing.
None of this is the same as being verified: no chartered accountant has yet read the certified copies and signed the summaries off, and every page still says so. It does mean that when a page says a decision still stands, someone went and looked, and can show you where.