ITR No. 104 of 1996 (1) IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB AND HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH ITR No. 104 of 1996 (O&M) Date of decision: 24.9.2010 C. I. T., Patiala ....Petitioner vs Industrial Cables (India) Limited Rajpura ...Respondent Coram: Hon'ble Mr. Justice Adarsh Kumar Goel Hon'ble Mr. Justice Rajesh Bindal Present: Mr. Tejinder K. Joshi, Advocate for the petitioner. Mr. Pankaj Jain, Advocate, for the respondent. Rajesh Bindal, J. The Income Tax Appellate Tribunal, Chandigarh Bench (hereinafter referred to as “the Tribunal”) has referred the following questions of law for opinion of this Court under Section 256 (1) of the Income Tax Act, 1961 ( for short “the Act') arising out of order dated 17.7.1995 in R. A. No. 274/CHANDI/95 in I. T. A. No. 635/ Chandi/90, in respect of the assessment year 1987-88:- “1. Whether on the facts and in the circumstances of the case, the Tribunal was right in law in allowing depreciation on tubewell @ 15% instead of 5%, u/s 32 of the Income Tax Act, 1961? 2. Whether on the facts and in the circumstances of the case, the Tribunal was right in law in allowing deduction of sales-tax liability paid before the due date as specified in the first proviso to section 43B, holding that the said proviso was applicable retrospectively?” As far as question no. 2 is concerned, learned counsel for the revenue fairly stated that the same is to be answered against the revenue in view of the judgment of Hon'ble the Supreme Court in Allied Motors (P) Ltd. vs Commissioner of Income-Tax (1997) 224 ITR 677. Accordingly, the question no. 2 is answered against the revenue and in favour of the assessee. As far as question no. 1 is concerned, learned counsel for assessee submitted that cost of the tubewell during the year in which the award of depreciation @ 15% instead of 5%, is sought to be disputed by the revenue was merely Rs. 2,900/-. Once the disputed amount is quite small, the tax effect would be even meager. The assessment year is 23 years old. ITR No. 104 of 1996 (2) The aforesaid fact is not denied by the learned counsel for the revenue. In view of the aforesaid facts and considering that the assessment year is more than two decades old, we do not proposed to deal with issue no. 2 and return the question unanswered. The reference is disposed of accordingly. (Rajesh Bindal) Judge 24.9.2010 (Adarsh Kumar Goel) vs Judge