Scholarship ad in Urdu does not mean it was intended for one community alone: Delhi High Court

The Delhi High Court has said that merely because an advertisement for scholarship was published in Urdu language, it cannot be presumed that it was intended for students belonging to a particular community alone [Commissioner of Income Tax (Exemption) Delhi v Hamdard National Foundation (India)]..A Division Bench of Justices Manmohan and Dinesh Kumar Sharma made the observation while dealing with a batch of appeals filed by Commissioner of Income Tax (Exemptions) challenging an order of the Income Tax Appellate Tribunal..The appeals said that a common question of law had arisen following the order the tribunal which allowed the appeal of the assessee (Hamdard Foundation) ignoring the fact that it had paid most of the scholarship amount to the students of a particular religious community. This it said was a clear violation of Section 13(1)(b) of the Income Tax Act, 1961.It was also submitted by the appellant that the advertisement for educational scholarship was published by the Foundation in Urdu language and, that too, in one newspaper only. This, it was argued, clearly indicated that the Foundation wanted to restrict the circulation of the scholarship advertisement as its intent was to provide benefit to a particular religious community only..However, the High Court said that a perusal of the paper-book revealed that both the Commissioner Income Tax (Appeal) and tribunal had given a concurrent finding that the benefit of the scholarship to the poor and needy students was not confined to students of a particular community.The Bench said that examination of the list submitted by the Hamdard Foundation also showed that the benefit of the scholarship had gone to students from all communities without any discrimination.“Moreover, just because advertisement was published in Urdu language and that too in one newspaper, it cannot be presumed that it was targeted at the students belonging to a particular community only. In fact, a similar finding of CIT(A) in the assessment year 2010-11 was accepted by the revenue and was not even challenged before the Tribunal,” the Court said. .Therefore, the court dismissed the appeals noting that no substantial question of law arose in them..While Senior Standing Counsel Abhishek Maratha appeared for the commissioner of income tax, Hamdard Foundation was represented by Senior Advocate Salil Aggarwal along with advocates Madhur Aggarwal and Uma Shankar..[Read Order]