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2. The facts, in brief, are that during the relevant previous year the assessee sold two factory buildings, namely R-321 and R-54. In so far as R-321 is concerned, there appears to be no real dispute on the foundational factual position that the said building had been acquired in the year 2009, had undergone structural changes and further construction, had been put to use, and had admittedly formed part of the block of assets on which depreciation under section 32 had been claimed by the assessee. The controversy, however, primarily centres around R- 54, which, as borne out from the material placed on record, was acquired in the financial year 2021-22 relevant to assessment year 2022-23 vide assignment deed dated 01.12.2021, and was thereafter subjected to further structural changes and Offshore Marinetech Private Limited construction. It is the consistent case of the assessee that this property was still under construction or under structural modification, was never put to use, and for that reason was never included in the block of assets and no depreciation thereon was ever claimed either in the preceding year or in the year under appeal. The said building was sold vide assignment deed dated 21.11.2022, i.e. within a short span of time from the date of acquisition.

7. Before us, the learned counsel for the assessee submitted that the entire controversy in truth lies in a narrow compass and turns on a fundamental jurisdictional fact for invoking section 50, namely, whether the asset in question formed part of a block of assets in respect of which depreciation had been allowed. He submitted that in so far as R-321 is concerned, the assessee has no quarrel with the proposition that section 50 would apply, because the building had been acquired long ago, had been put to use, and had admittedly formed part of the depreciable block. His emphatic grievance, however, is that R-54 stands on a completely different pedestal. It was submitted that R-54 was acquired only on 01.12.2021, was subjected to structural changes and further construction, was never put to use, was never added to the block of assets in the return of income or tax audit report, and no depreciation under section 32 was ever claimed. The learned counsel drew our attention to the fact that even during the immediately preceding assessment year 2022- 23, the Assessing Officer had specifically inquired into this very aspect and the assessee had furnished details of purchase and Offshore Marinetech Private Limited construction; yet no addition or disallowance was made and the treatment adopted by the assessee was not disturbed. Thus, according to him, it is not even the Revenue's case that depreciation was actually allowed on R-54 in any year.

19. In so far as R-321 is concerned, the position is materially different. The property was acquired in 2009, was put to use after suitable structural changes and further construction, and depreciation under section 32 was claimed thereon. Therefore, the applicability of section 50 to R-321 is not in serious dispute. The assessee itself, in its working, has accepted the block concept for R-321 and has computed short term capital gain by taking the written down value of the block and the actual cost incurred during the year into account. Thus, the legal controversy before us is really not about the applicability of section 50 to R-321, but about the impermissible clubbing of R- 54 with R-321 for the purpose of computing one composite deemed short term capital gain.