The Income Tax Appellate Tribunal (ITAT) Bench at Chennai has recently held that, the claim of the assessee, K Gomati that Rs. 39 Lakhs was received as gift from husband during the assessment proceedings was merely an afterthought of search. Subsequently, the addition made by the Assessing Officer (AO) was upheld.
T V Muthu Abirami, on behalf of the assessee contended that legal ground taken by the assessee is purely a question of law which goes to root of the matter and thus, the same can be taken at any time of the proceedings including proceedings before the Tribunal and thus, petition filed by the assessee may be admitted.
During the course of search, some loose sheets were found and seized which contains one Sale Deed belonging to the assessee, Smt. K. Gomathi. During post search proceedings, a Summons under Section 131 of the Income Tax Act, 1961 was issued and sworn statement was recorded from the assessee.
In response to the notice, the assessee has filed her return of income on 30.08.2018 admitting total income of Rs.50 Lakhs which includes undisclosed income of Rs.46.79 Lakhs offered during the course of search. She further admitted that investment in purchase of four properties was not disclosed and also agreed to offer undisclosed income of Rs.46.79 Lakhs.
However, after a period of two years, she had changed her arguments and claimed the source for purchase of property out of a gift received from her husband.
The AO further noticed that although, the assessee claims to have received gift from her husband, but on verification of details, it was noticed that the so-called gift claims to have received from her husband, is in cash and thus, opined that the assessee has failed to prove the claim of gift with necessary evidences.
The Commissioner of Income Tax, M Rajan submitted on behalf of the department that, “If you go through the claim of the assessee, out of Rs.46,79,000/- sum of Rs. 39,75,000/- gift was received by cash and the assessee could not explain the same with necessary evidences including declaration of cash in hand for the relevant assessment year, wealth tax returns filed by her husband. The balance amount of Rs.7 lakhs was also claimed to have been paid through proper banking channel, but no evidence was filed.”
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