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Showing contexts for: settlor beneficiary same in Green Maiden A 2013 Trust, Mumbai vs Assistant Commissioner Of Income Tax ... on 30 January, 2023Matching Fragments
Therefore, as can be seen from the definitions, the Trust created in terms of the deed of settlement is consistent with the requirements of both, the Indian Trusts Act as well as Trust (Jersey) Law, 1984 as to what constitutes a trust.
P a g e |9 ITA No.2105, 1977 & 1978/Mum/2022 Green Maiden A 2013 Trust Vs. ACIT IT, Circle 2(3)(2) 27 As to the ground that the settlor cannot be a sole beneficiary, as ADIA was settlor as well as sole beneficiary, first of all the Act does not make any such provision. Secondly, there is no provision under the Indian Trust Act also which debars the settlor from being beneficiary. In the case of Bhavna Nalinkant Nanavati (supra), the settlor of the trust was also the sole beneficiary in the Deed of Settlement. The Gujarat High Court, while interpreting Section 3 of the Indian Trust Act observed as under:
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"The ownership of trust property has to be for the benefit of a person or more than one person of whom the settlor may himself be one but never for the benefit of an owner alone, viz the trustee. There cannot be a case where the creator of the trust would also be the trustee and also the sole beneficiary, because in such cases a man cannot enforce a trust against himself."
Thus, it follows that the settlor cannot be the trustee and sole beneficiary. In the present instance, the settlor is not the trustee but is the sole beneficiary which is clearly permissible.
31. In our view, therefore, the Deed of Settlement dated 22nd July 2013, whereby the trust was set up, contained specific clauses which established the revocable nature of the trust. As the ADIA has settled the trust on the terms mentioned in the Deed of Settlement, the contribution made by it to the trust would be a transfer as defined in Section 63 of the Act. As Section 63 does not anywhere specify that a trust covered by it must necessarily be a trust falling under the Indian Trust Act 1882 and as per Section 63(b) of the Act, any settlement or trust is included within the meaning of 'transfer' and Section 63(b) does not provide that the trust described therein needs to be an Indian Trust, the provisions of Sections 61 to 63 of the Act are applicable to the case at hand. As the term 'trust' is not defined either in Section 63 or Section 2 of the Act 'trust' would clearly be a trust as one understands the term in its common parlance. Even if one has to have recourse to the definition of the term "trust" in Section 3 of the Indian Trust Act 1882, i.e., an obligation annexed to the ownership of property, and arising out of a confidence reposed in and accepted by the owners, or declared and accepted by him, for the benefit of another, or of another and the owner, there is nothing in the language of Section 61 or 63 that restricts its applicability only to trusts settled in India and accordingly, AAR was not justified in concluding that a Foreign Trust will not be covered under the said provisions. AAR while expressing its view that India has not ratified Hague Convention on the law applicable to trust has overlooked the fact that ADIA is not seeking to apply Foreign Law to India but is merely seeking an application of Section 61 which in no manner excludes, from it applicability, a trust settled outside India. A Foreign Trust can be treated as a trust under the Act also appears from the income tax return forms prescribed under the Act wherein Schedule FA, Para F, in form ITR-5, require the disclosure of "details of trusts" created under the laws of a country outside India, in which one is trustee, beneficiary or settlor. There are similar requirements in Form ITR-2, ITR- 6 and ITR-7. Therefore, the Act presupposes that a Foreign Trust is a trust for the purposes of the Act. In Vikramsinghjit of Gondal (Supra), the Apex Court has applied the provisions of Section 164 and 166 of the Act to tax the beneficiary of a trust settled in U.K.
33. As there is no bar to the settlor and beneficiary being the same person and in view of the judgment in Bhavana Nalinkant Nanavati (supra) where the court has interpreted Section 3 of the Indian Trust Act, 1882 as creating a fiduciary relationship between the trustee and the beneficiary, where the ownership of the trust property has to be for the benefit of another person which can include the settlor himself, if one reads Sections 61 and 63 of the Act, it is quite clear that Section 61 is independent of Section 63 of the Act and a transfer can be a revocable transfer on its own merits and is not restricted only to trusts. A "settlement" or a "trust" are instances of what amount to transfer. So long as the settlor has a right to reassume power over the assets settled, the same would amount to revocable transfer. In the facts of the case at hand, ADIA could reassume the power and hence the contribution to the trust was a revocable transfer thereby making the income arising to the trust taxable in the hands of ADIA which was exempt under Article 24 of India-UAE DTAA. The tax liability of a trust has to be determined by applying the provisions of the Act alongwith the provisions of India-UAE DTAA and not apply the law as applicable in Jersey.