Case Law Details
Ajay Bhandari Vs Union of India (Allahabad High Court)
Reassessment — Reopening of assessment — Reopening notice issued under unammended provisions — Reliefs sought in petition is to quash impugned notice u/s 148 — Held, as per Clauses 6.2 and 7.1 of Board’s Circular dated 11.05.2022, if a case does not fall under Clause (b) of sub-Section (i) of Section 149 for Assessment Years 2013-14, 2014-15 and 2015-16 (where income of an assessee escaping assessment to tax is less than Rs.50,00,000/-) and notice has not been issued within limitation under unamended provisions of Section 149, then proceedings under amended provisions cannot be initiated — For all reasons aforestated, impugned notice under Section 148 issued on 01.04.2021 for Assessment Year 2014-15 and impugned notice dated 13.01.2022 under Section 144 and reassessment order dated 13.01.2022 under Section 147 read with Section 144B passed by respondent No.4 are hereby quashed — Assessee’s petition allowed.
As per Clause-7.1 of the CBDT Instruction No. 01/2022 dated 11.05.2022, the notices under Section 148 relating to the Assessment Years 2013-14, 2014-15 and 2015-16, shall not attract the judgment of Hon’ble Supreme Court in the case of Ashish Agarwal and the impugned notice under Section 148 issued on 01.04.2021 for the Assessment Year 2014-15 is, therefore, clearly barred by limitation and consequently without jurisdiction. Therefore, in view of the admission made by the learned Additional Solicitor General on behalf of the respondents, we do not propose to deal with the other arguments of learned counsel for the petitioner as noted in paragraph-6 above and thus all other questions including the question of conferment of jurisdiction etc., are left open.
As per Clauses 6.2 and 7.1 of CBDT Instruction No. 01/2022 dated 11.05.2022, if a case does not fall under Clause (b) of sub-Section (i) of Section 149 of the Act, 1961 for the Assessment Years 2013-14, 2014-15 and 2015-16 (where the income of an assessee escaping assessment to tax is less than Rs.50,00,000/-) and notice has not been issued within limitation under the unamended provisions of Section 149, then proceedings under the amended provisions cannot be initiated.
For all the reasons aforestated, the impugned notice under Section 148 of the Act, 1961 issued on 01.04.2021 for the Assessment Year 2014-15 and the impugned notice dated 13.01.2022 under Section 144 of the Act, 1961 and the reassessment order dated 13.01.2022 under Section 147 read with Section 144B of the Act, 1961 for the Assessment Year 2014-15 passed by the respondent No.4 are hereby quashed. The writ petition is allowed.
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