A taxpayer can claim a refund of tax payments based on favorable Supreme Court rulings that redefine the taxability of income, irrespective of previous self-declarations.

ORDER :

1. In this petition, petitioner seeks for the following reliefs:-

“i. this Hon’ble Court may be pleased to issue a writ of Certiorari or a writ in the nature of Certiorari or any other appropriate writ, order or direction under Article 226 of the Constitution of India calling for the records of the Petitioner’s case and after examining the legality and validity thereof quash the impugned Order dated 04.02.2022 passed by the Respondent No.1 under Section 264 of the IT Act in DIN & Order No.ITBA/REV/F/REV7/2021-22/1039395687(1) for the AY 2019-20 vide ANNEXURE ‘J’.

ii. this Hon’ble Court may be pleased to issue a writ of Mandamus or a writ in the nature of Mandamus or any other appropriate writ, order or direction under Article 226 of the Constitution of India directing the Respondent No.3 to issue the eligible refund of taxes along with applicable interest under section 244A of the IT Act;

iii. issue any other writ, order or direction to which the Petitioner is found entitles to in the present facts and circumstances.”

2. Heard learned Senior counsel for the petitioner and learned counsel for the respondents and perused the material on record.

3. In addition to reiterating the various contentions urged in the memorandum of petition and referring to the material on record, learned Senior counsel for the petitioner submits that on 28.11.2019, the petitioner filed income tax returns, which was processed by respondent No.2, who issued a notice under Section 143 (1) of the Income Tax Act. It was pointed out that when the petitioner filed the said returns, the various High Courts had delivered judgments as regards taxability of the income tax classified as royalty on the Income Tax Act and on the basis of the said judgments, the petitioner filed returns to seek refund in the event the said issue is answered in favour of the assessee by the Apex Court. It is submitted that subsequently, the judgment of this Court in the case of CIT Vs. Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd. (2012) 345 ITR 494 was reversed by the Apex Court, which answered the issue in favour of the petitioner-assessee by holding that the amounts paid as resident Indian end users/distributors to non-resident computer software manufacturers/supplies as consideration for the resale/use of the computer software through end-user license agreement (EULA)/distribution agreements were not in the nature of royalty and that the same did not give rise to any taxable income in India and the persons referred to under Section 198 of the I.T. Act were not liable for TDS under Section 90 of the I.T. Act. It is accordingly submitted that pursuant to the aforesaid judgment of the Apex Court which attained finality and became conclusive and binding upon the respondents, petitioner filed revision application under Section 264 of the I.T. Act, which was rejected by the respondent by passing the impugned order at Annexure-J dated 04.02.2022, which is assailed in the present petition.

4. Per contra, learned counsel for the respondents would support the impugned order and submits that there is no merit in the petition and that the same is liable to be dismissed.

5. Before adverting to the rival submissions, it would be necessary to extract Income Tax Returns in particular, the notes appended to the Income Tax Returns, which is hereunder:

“Qualys Inc., US AY 2019-20 Notes to the return of Income for the financial year 2018-19

1. Background Qualys Inc ('Qualys'/ ‘the Company') is a company incorporated in the USA. The Company is engaged in providing Software as Service (‘SaaS’) to its clients across the world.

The Company is a 'tax resident’ of USA and holds a valid tax residency certificate (‘TRC’) issued by the US tax authorities, covering the