Law:

Section:

Section 10(15A), read with section 195, of the Income-tax Act, 1961 - Exemptions - Any payment made by Indian company, engaged in operation of aircraft, to acquire aircraft on lease - Whether for getting benefit of provision of section 10(15A), approval of agreement by Central Government is a must - Held, yes - Petitioner, a foreign company leased two aircrafts to an Indian company - Its application under section 10(15A) seeking approval of lease agreements was rejected without a speaking order - Whether since no cogent reasons had been given for rejecting application under section 10(15A), impugned order of CBDT was to be quashed - Held, yes Man Mohan, Abhinav Vasisht and Ms. Prachi Vasisht for the Petitioner. Ms. Prem Lata Bansal, S.C. Sharma, A.N. Haksar andSakesh Kumar for the Respondent. ORDER B.C. Patel, CJ. - The petitioners have filed this writ petition, inter alia, praying that (i) orders dated 15-11-2000 and 4-3-2002 of the Chairman, Central Board of Direct Taxes be quashed; (ii) direction be issued to respondent Nos. 1 and 2 to grant approval to the lease agreements dated 18-10-1999 under section 10(15A) of the Income-tax Act, 1961 (hereinafter referred to as 'the Act') in respect of two aircrafts leased to respondent No.3; and (iii) direction be issued to the Central Board of Direct Taxes to refund the amount of Rs. 10,98,42,772 withheld and paid under section 195 of the Act in respect of the lease rents paid to the owner of the aircrafts. In the alternative, it is prayed that a direction be issued directing the Central Board of Direct Taxes to reconsider the application under section 10(15A) of the Act seeking approval to the two lease agreements dated 18-10-1999 in respect of the two aircrafts leased to respondent No.3 company. 2. We have heard the learned counsel appearing in this matter and we may straightaway say that we are not inclined to grant reliefs (i) to (iii). Insofar as the relief (iv) is concerned, the provisions of section 10(15A) of the Act needs to be examined. The same reads as under :- "10(15A) any payment made, by an Indian company engaged in the business of operation of aircraft, to acquire an aircraft or an aircraft engine…

Deprecated: trim(): Passing null to parameter #1 ($string) of type string is deprecated in /home/digixyei/sldsystempk.com/view/master-layout/view_case.php on line 492