Dinesh Maheshwari JUDGMENT
Dinesh Maheshwari, J.
PRELIMINARY WITH BRIEF OUTLINE
1. Leave granted.
2. The short point calling for determination in these appeals against the common judgment dated 09.06.2016 passed by the High Court of Kerala at Ernakulam in a batch of appeals is as to whether the income received by the Appellants in foreign exchange, for the services provided by them to foreign enterprises, qualifies for deduction Under Section 80-O of the Income Tax Act, 19611, as applicable during the respective assessment years from 1993-94 to 1997-98.
3. Put in a nutshell, the question involved in these appeals has arisen in the backdrop of facts that the Appellants herein, who had been engaged in providing services to certain foreign buyers of frozen seafood and/or marine products and had received service charges from such foreign buyers/enterprises in foreign exchange, claimed deduction Under Section 80-O of the Act of 1961, as applicable for the relevant assessment year/s. In both these cases, the respective Assessing Officer/s2 denied such claim for deduction essentially with the finding that the services rendered by respective Assessees were the 'services rendered in India' and not the 'services rendered from India' and, therefore, the service charges received by the Assessees from the foreign enterprises did not qualify for deduction in view of Clause (iii) of the Explanation to Section 80-O of the Act of 1961. After different orders from the respective Appellate Authorities, the Income Tax Appellate Tribunal3, Cochin Bench accepted the claim for such deduction Under Section 80-O of the Act with the finding in case of the Assessee Ramnath & Co.4 for the assessment year 1993-94 that as per the agreements with the referred foreign enterprises, the Assessee had passed on the necessary information which were utilised by the foreign enterprises concerned to make a decision either to purchase or not to purchase; and hence, it were a service rendered from India. The same decision was followed by ITAT in the case of this Assessee for other assessment years under consideration as also in the case of other Assessee M/s. Laxmi Agencies5. The revenue preferred appeals before the High Court against the orders so passed by ITAT in favour of the present Appellants as also a few other Assessees. These appeals have been considered together by the High Court of Kerala; and similar questions regarding eligibility for deduction Under Section 80-O of the Act in relation to the similarly circumstanced Assessees have been decided by the impugned comm........