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Showing contexts for: revised return when valid in Commissioner Of Income-Tax vs Andhra Cotton Mills Ltd. on 9 August, 1996Matching Fragments
R.C. No. 58 of 1986 (CIT v. Andhra Cotton Mills Ltd. , is a case where the assessee had filed a return for the assessment year 1979-80 claiming deduction of depreciation and subsequently filed a revised return withdrawing the claim for deduction of depreciation. The contention of the assessee in that case was that when a revised return was filed the original return got substituted, and, therefore, the Income-tax Officer should not have relied on the original return. That argument did not appeal to the Bench of this court which decided that case. The Bench observed that under section 139(5) of the Act a revised return could be filed, if there was an omission or wrong statement, and that the assessee did in fact prepare a profit and loss account providing for depreciation, and that in the original return the profit and loss account containing the provision for depreciation had been filed, and that under the circumstances, it could not be said that there was any wrong statement in the original return which could enable the assessee to file a revised return under section 139(5) of the Act, and that, therefore, the revised return was not a valid return for being processed by the Income-tax Officer. It was under those circumstances, the Bench held, on the basis of the original return, that was not a case where the assessee did not claim deduction of depreciation and where the particulars of depreciation were not given. On those findings, therefore, the assessee could not rely on sub-section (1) of section 34 of the Act as in force at the relevant time which provided that "the deductions referred to in sub-section (1) or sub-section (1A) of section 32 shall be allowed only if the prescribed particulars have been furnished ...". It is in that context that the Bench observed that (page 407) "no doubt, section 34 provides that the deduction shall be allowed only if the prescribed particulars are furnished... but this cannot be construed to mean that where the assessee deliberately withholds the information, no deduction for depreciation could be given in computing the income". Those observations were not really necessary for arriving at a decision in that case, because the Bench already held that the revised return was not a valid return, and that in the original return the assessee did claim deduction for depreciation and particulars were available because the profit and loss account providing for depreciation was filed along with the original return. We, therefore, find that those observations were only "obiter dicta". We may also observe that the Bench did not notice the circular of the Central Board of Revenue dated August 31, 1965, which directed that "where the required particulars have not been furnished by the assessee and no claim for depreciation has been made in the return, the Income-tax Officer should estimate the income without allowing depreciation allowance".