9911796707
TMI Blog2012 (7) TMI 561X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... ner is a society registered on 27th February, 1978 under the Societies Registration Act, 1860 in the name of "Mahavira Foundation". It is engaged in imparting education and runs a school in Delhi by the name Mahavir Senior Model School for the past 25 years or more. It is being regularly assessed under the Act in respect of its returns filed with the Trust Ward-IV at New Delhi. The petitioner is also registered under the Act under Section 12A of the Act vide certificate dated 21st July, 1978. In respect of the amounts received as donations by the petitioner, it has been granted exemption under Section 80G of the Act from time to time and the latest of such certificates is dated 25th July, 2008 which was valid upto 31st March, 2011. 3. By order dated 6th September, 2004, the petitioner has already been granted exemption under Section 10(23C)(vi) of the Act upto and including the assessment year 2004-05 by the DGIT(E). Before the aforesaid years, the petitioner has always been granted exemption under the aforesaid Section. It is stated that the petitioner‟s application for the approval under the aforesaid Section for the assessment years 2005-06 to 2007-08 is pending. ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... he gist of the provisions relating to the approval of an educational institution for the purposes of Section 10(23C)(vi) of the Act. 5. In terms of the powers vested by these provisions on the respondent, he called upon the petitioner to produce its books of accounts and vouchers in order to verify the genuineness of the activities carried on by the petitioner. The books of accounts were produced along with the vouchers. On an examination of the same, the respondent found what he describes as serious irregularities/manipulations/fabrications of the books of accounts disentitling the petitioner to the approval under the Section. Broadly these can be divided into the following categories:- 1. Payment of bills of Mahavir Video Studio in connection with the annual day celebration of the petitioner. 2. Payment of bills of M/s Beli Ram Chaman Lal Jain in connection with the silver articles supplied for the Silver Jubilee Celebration function of the petitioner-school. 3. Payment of bills of Shankar Halwai for supplies made during the annual day function of the school for the financial year 2007-08, 4. Payments made by the petitioner in respect of two identical sets of bills fo ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... t of these payments, though the petitioner could not produce the proprietor of the Video Studio, it produced the relevant bill books from which the three bills were issued to the petitioner. The irregularities noticed by the respondent are only that one bill for Rs.35,950/- was not dated. However, the bill produced by the petitioner contained the date as 31st March, 2007 and it was explained that the date was written by it so that the period to which the payment pertained could be easily identified. From this explanation, the respondent seems to have inferred that the petitioner attempted to create a false impression that the bill was issued by the Video Studio on 31st March, 2007 while no date was put in the bill by the Studio. The argument of the respondent is that the petitioner could have put the date on any other place on the bill if the purpose was to merely identify the period to which it related and that it ought not to have put the date at the appropriate place which had been left blank by the Video Studio. We do not mean to belittle the importance of the examination of the accounts embarked upon by the respondent but it seems to us the main issue which he ought to have fo ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... serious, but we have our own doubts as to whether on the material produced before the respondent, he could have drawn such serious inferences against the petitioner and whether he could conclude that the account books were manipulated or fabricated merely because of certain irregularities in the evidence adduced in support of the payments. The books of accounts of the petitioner are audited every year. It has been averred in the petition that the annual receipts and expenses of the school are more than Rs.3 crores. The accounts are audited and the audited balance sheet for the years 31.3.2006 to 31.3.2008 have been filed. It is also seen from the averments made in the writ petition that the payments to Mahavir Video Studio were all made through cheques and the bank statements were also produced before the respondent. These facts have not been questioned. As regards the payments made to M/s Beli Ram Chaman Lal Jain, they are stated to be for 84 silver shields which were given to the teachers to honour them. The explanation of the petitioner is that the articles were supplied first since the suppliers were well known to the petitioner for the several years and bills were sent later. ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X
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