ITO Vs Prakash Pandurang Patil (Supreme Court of India)
In a significant development for income tax reassessment procedures, the Supreme Court of India has dismissed a Special Leave Petition filed by the Income Tax Department against a Bombay High Court judgment. The case, ITO vs. Prakash Pandurang Patil, centered on the validity of a reassessment notice issued for Assessment Year 2018-19. The Supreme Court’s decision, dated August 18, 2025, not only noted a substantial delay in the Revenue’s filing but also upheld the high court’s ruling on its merits, affirming key principles of income tax law.
Read Bombay HC Judgment: Section 148 Notice Quashed for Breach of Faceless Reassessment Rules
The case originated when the taxpayer, Prakash Pandurang Patil, challenged a reassessment notice and a prior order issued by the Jurisdictional Assessing Officer (JAO) on April 5, 2022. The petitioner argued that these actions were invalid because they were not conducted under the mandatory faceless mechanism, which had been implemented by a notification dated March 29, 2022, under Section 151A of the Income Tax Act, 1961.
The Bombay High Court had previously quashed the reassessment notice, relying on its own precedent in the case of Hexaware Technologies Ltd v. ACIT. In that ruling, the court had clarified that there is no “concurrent jurisdiction” between a JAO and a Faceless Assessing Officer (FAO). The court held that once the faceless scheme came into force, the power to issue reassessment notices under Section 148 shifted exclusively to the FAO through an automated allocation system. To hold otherwise, the court reasoned, would render the entire faceless regime redundant. The Bombay High Court emphasized that any action taken by an authority in a manner contrary to statutory procedure is inherently invalid and causes prejudice to the assessee.
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