It is settled position of law that where any issue is debatable, it cannot be corrected u/s 154 of the Act. In this regard, the Hon’ble Apex Court in the case of T.S. Balaram ITO v. Volkart Bros. [1971] 82 ITR 50 is relevant wherein an action taken by Assessing Officer u/s 154 of the Act was found to be illegal.
In the instant case also, the assessee furnished all the details relating to its claim for deduction u/s 80IB of the Act and the Assessing Officer thoroughly examined the claim while framing the assessment u/s 143(3) and on being satisfied the claim was allowed. Therefore, in the present case, reopening of the assessment by issuing notice u/s 148 of the Act is definitely a change of opinion which is not maintainable and therefore, the re-assessment framed by the Assessing Officer u/s 147 of by issuing notice u/s 148 of the Act after completing the assessment u/s 143(3) of the Act by taking a view which was in consonance with the judgment of the Hon’ble jurisdictional High Court was not valid.
It is very clear that the assessee consciously split up the payments in whole of the year, which is impracticable, illogical as noted above and it was done just to circumvent the provisions of law. There was no justification for the assessee to split up the transactions of crores of rupees in small payments of Rs. 15,000/- to Rs. 20,000/- everyday. Whatever plea was taken before the authorities below was not supported by any evidence.
In the present case, a categorical finding is recorded by the Tribunal that the books were never rejected. This aspect has not been considered by the Hon’ble High Court. In the circumstances, the reliance placed on the report of the DVO was misconceived”. By observing these observations, the decision of Hon’ble High Court was set aside and the order passed by the Tribunal was restored by the Hon’ble Apex Court. The facts in the present case are similar as in this case also no books of account were rejected before referring the matter u/s 142A of the Act.
The assessment is framed u/s. 153A of the IT Act, which is specifically meant for computation of undisclosed income, which is found during the course of search. The assessee in order to circumvent the provisions of law have tried to reduce the amount in question out of total undisclosed income determined in the course of search by claiming a bad debt which was never claimed in the regular books of account or in the original return of income filed u/s. 139(1) of the IT Act.
In the present case, it is an admitted fact that the partners Shri C.P. Mathur and Shri L.C. Mathur contributed Rs. 8 lacs and Rs. 4,30,000/- respectively as their capital and the Assessing Officer made the addition by invoking the provisions of section 68 of the Income-tax Act. On a similar issue, the Hon’ble Jurisdictional High Court in the case of Kewal Krishan & Partners, Sri Ganganagar (supra) held as under :-
Reckoning point to compute the time limit will be drawing of last panchnama in respect of any authorization issued in a particular case. However, it has already been held that the last panchnama as relevant for Explanation 2 to section 158BE will be the panchnama which show the conclusion of the search. Panchnama dated 3rd January, 2003 in the present case has not recorded the conclusion of search, but, it was a mere formality to revoke prohibitory order passed on 21st December, 2002. Therefore, the limitation was to be reckoned from 21st December, 2002.
To avail exemption under section 11(1)(d) in respect of Voluntary contributions made with a specific direction that they shall form part of the corpus of the trust/institution, identity of donor(s) must be established- If identity of donors not established, there is no question of the donations having been received with such a direction since such a direction could be validly given by the donor only at the time of giving the donation.
