For the AY the assessee had deposited the tax deducted at source on salaries paid to its employees within the prescribed due date to the credit of the Central Government but filed the quarterly statements of deduction of tax at source u/s. 200(3) in form 24Q with respect to the salaries paid to the employees beyond the time stipulated under rule 31A . The assessee had given an explanation to the effect that it employed more than 200 employees spread all over several locations across the country making it difficult to collate the information to prepare these quarterly returns in time as those employees were travelling on official duties. The permanent account numbers of all the employees was made mandatory in e-filing of statements of quarterly tax deducted at source returns without which the statements could not be filed on to the Department’s server. Secondly, several modifications in the formats and software system of e-filing of quarterly tax deducted at source returns were made by the Department from time to time apart from technical glitches in the working of the Department’s software which caused those delays in filing of quarterly tax deducted at source returns in form 24Q for AY 2011-12. For subsequent periods, those delays were substantially reduced and ultimately all statements of quarterly tax deducted at source returns in forms 24Q, 26Q and 27Q were filed in time. The provisions of S..272A(2)(k) were subject to the provisions of s.273B and the cause shown by the assessee was a reasonable cause. The burden was on the Department to provide the necessary infrastructure so that taxpayers would not face any inconvenience in filing the returns. Since, the Income-tax deducted at source was deposited in time and only the returns were delayed in the initial years of the change, therefore penalty levied u/s.272A(2)(k) was not sustainable as the assessee had shown a reasonable cause falling within the parameters of S.273B. (AY.2011 – 2012)