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SUPREME COURT OF INDIA
Sanjay Kishan Kaul, Indu Malhotra, JJ.
NATIONAL CO-OPERATIVE DEVELOPMENT CORPORATION – Appellant
Versus
COMMISSIONER OF INCOME TAX, DELHI-V – Respondent
Civil Appeal Nos. 5105-5107 of 2009
Decided on : 11-09-2020
NATIONAL COOPERATIVE DEVELOPMENT CORPORATION - TAXATION - INTEREST INCOME - DEDUCTION - REVENUE EXPENDITURE - CAPITAL RECEIPT - ADVANCE RULING SYSTEM - ADVANCE TAX RULING COUNCIL - GOVERNMENT LITIGATION POLICY - LITIGATION POLICY - ADVANCE RULING SYSTEM - ADVANCE TAX RULING COUNCIL - GOVERNMENT LITIGATION POLICY - LITIGATION POLICY
Fact of the Case:
The appellant-Corporation, National Co-operative Development Corporation, was established under the National Cooperative Development Corporation Act, 1962. The appellant-Corporation is an intermediary or "pass through" entity, it is a distinct juridical entity. Its taxation status is as follows: i. Insofar as funds are received from the Central Government, these are treated as capital receipts, and hence are not chargeable to tax. There is no dispute about this. ii. With respect to the interest component, it is treated as taxable income and is logically taxed as "business income." The issue which has arisen for consideration is whether the component of interest income earned on the funds received under Section 13(1), and disbursed by way of "grants" to national or state level co-operative societies, is eligible for deduction for determining the "taxable income" of the appellant-Corporation.
Finding of the Court:
We are unable to agree with the findings arrived at by the AO, ITAT and the High Court albeit for different reasons and concur with the view taken by the CIT(A) for the reasons set out hereinbefore.
Issues: Whether the component of interest income earned on the funds received under Section 13(1), and disbursed by way of "grants" to national or state level co-operative societies, is eligible for deduction for determining the "taxable income" of the appellant-Corporation.
Ratio Decidendi: The interest income generated is not directly received as a capital amount. It is actually generated by utilising the capital receipts when the fund is lying idle though the income so generated is then applied for the very objective for which the appellant-Corporation was set up, i.e., disbursement of grants and advancement of loans. The impugned judgment of the High Court appears to us to have dealt with both loans and grants, but the question of references framed, and which is a position accepted before us, is that the dispute related to only grants. It was not the appellant-Corporation's case that the amounts advanced as loans, the same being payable with interest, could be adjusted as expenses against the business income generated by investing the amounts and consequently earning interest on the same. The argument was predicated on a reasoning that since the interest generated is treated as a business income, the grants made, which would never come back, should be adjustable as expenses against the same. In fact, to the extent grants were returned back, the CIT(A) did not allow the entire deduction as claimed for but only did so qua the amount which was disbursed as grant and never received back.
Final Decision: The appeals are allowed, leaving the parties to bear their own costs, while noticing with regret the inordinately long passage of time and the wastage of judicial time on deciding, who is principally right when in either eventuality it benefits the Central Government.
JUDGMENT
Sanjay Kishan Kaul, J.
Which pocket of the Government should be enriched has taken forty-four (44) years to decide - a classic case of what ought not to be!
The factual matrix:
2. The appellant-Corporation, National Co-operative Development Corporation, was established under the National Cooperative Development Corporation Act, 1962 (hereinafter referred to as the 'NCDC Act'). The Preamble of the NCDC Act reads as under:
"An Act to provide for the incorporation and regulation of a Corporation for the purpose of planning and promoting programmes for the production, processing, marketing, storage, export and import of agricultural produce, foodstuffs, industrial goods, livestock, certain other commodities and services on cooperative principles and for matters connected therewith or incidental thereto."
3. The functions of the appellant-Corporation are set out in Section 9 of the NCDC Act, which is, inter alia, to advance loans or grant subsidies to State Governments for financing cooperative societies; provide loans and grants directly to the national level cooperative societies, as also to the State level cooperative societies, the latter on the guarantee of State Governments. The funding process for the appellant-Corporation is set out in Section 12 of the NCDC Act, by way of grants and loans received from the Central Government. The appellant-Corporation is required to maintain a fund called the National Cooperative Development Fund (for short 'the Fund') which is, inter alia, credited with all monies received by it by way of grants and loans from the Central Government, as well as sums of money as may from time to time be realised out of repayment of loans made from the Fund or from interest on loans or dividends or other realisations on investments made from the Fund. Section 13 mandates maintenance of a Fund and the same reads as under:
"13. Corporation to maintain fund.- (1) The Corporation shall maintain a fund called the National Cooperative Development Fund (hereinafter referred to as the Fund) to which shall be credited-
(a) all moneys and other securities transferred to it under clause (a) of sub-section (2) of section 24;
(b) the grants and other sums of money by way of loans paid to the Corporation by the Central Government under section 12;
(bb) all moneys received under section 12B;
(bbb) all moneys received for services rendered;
(ba) all moneys borrowed under section 12A;
(c) such additional grants, if any, as the Central Government may make to the Corporation for the purposes of this Act; and
(d) such sums of money as may, from time to time, be realised out of repayment of loans made from the Fund or from interest on loans or dividends or other realisations on investments made from the Fund.
(2) The moneys in the Fund shall be applied for-
(a) advancing loans and granting subsidies to State Governments on such terms and conditions as the Corporation may deem fit for the purpose of enabling State Governments to subscribe to the share capital of co-operative societies or for otherwise financing co-operative societies:
(b) meeting the pay and allowances of the managing director, the officers and other employees of the Corporation and other administrative expenses of the Corporation; and
(c) carrying out the purposes of this Act." (emphasis supplied)
In furtherance of this, as and when surplus funds accumulated, the appellant-Corporation invested the idle funds in fixed deposits from time to time, which generated income. It may also be noted that income by way of interest on debentures and loans advanced to the State Governments/Apex Cooperative Institutions are credited to this account.
4. Even though the appellant-Corporation is an intermediary or "pass through" entity, it is a distinct juridical entity. Its taxation status is as follows:
i. Insofar as funds are received from the Central Government, these are treated as capital receipts, and hence are not chargeable to tax. There is no dispute about this.
ii. With res
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