No sec. 68 additions on cash deposited in bank account if assessee wasn't maintaining books of account

Facts:

a) On the basis of information from the CIT that during the year under consideration assessee had made a 'cash deposit' in her saving bank account with Punjab and Maharashtra Co-operative Bank, the case of the assessee was reopened.

b) During the course of the assessment proceedings, the Assessing Officer (AO) called upon the assessee to put forth an explanation as regards the nature and source of the cash deposit in her saving bank account.

c) The assessee placed on record substantial documentary evidence in form of summarized cash analysis to explain the genesis of the cash deposit.

d) AO was not in agreement with the explanation of the assessee and, hence, rejected the same and held the said cash deposit as an 'unexplained cash credit' and added the same to the returned income of the assessee by invoking the provisions of section 68.

e) On appeal, CIT(A) upheld order of AO. Aggrieved-assessee filed instant appeal before Tribunal.

Tribunal held in favour of assessee as under:-

1) A bare perusal of the section 68 reveals that an addition under the said statutory provision can only be made where any sum is found credited in the books of an assessee maintained for any previous year. Thus, the very sine qua non for making of an addition under section 68 presupposes a credit of the aforesaid amount in the 'books of an  assessee' maintained for the previous year.

2) A credit in the 'bank account' of an assessee could not be construed as a credit in the 'books of the assessee', for the very reason that the bank account could not be held to be the 'books' of the assessee.

3) Bombay High Court in the case of CIT v. Bhaichand N. Gandhi [1982] 11 Taxman 59 held that a bank pass book or bank statement cannot be considered to be a 'book' maintained by the assessee for any previous year, as understood for the purpose of section 68.

4) Giving a thoughtful consideration to the scope and gamut of the aforesaid statutory provision, viz., section 68, it was to be held that an addition made in respect of a cash deposit in the 'bank account' in the absence of the same found credited in the 'books of the assessee' maintained for the previous year, could not be brought to tax. - [2017] 80 taxmann.com 311 (Mumbai - Trib.)