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Judgment
PER KRINWANT SAHAY A.M.
Appeal in this case has been filed by the Assessee against the order dated 21.10.2024 passed by the Ld. CIT(A)/ NFAC, Delhi for the A.Y. 2011-12.
The assessee has raised following grounds of appeal :-
1.The Id CIT (Appeals) has erred in passing exparte order rejecting the appeal without even reading the grounds of appeal nor adjudicating any of them. The reply submitted earlier on 14/11/2019 before CIT (A), Faridabad has not been considered at all. The appellant was ill for quite sometime at the age of over 80 yrs (DOB 26/01/1930) could not pay attention to notices alleged to have been sent only online. They never reached the appellants knowledge for compliance Certificate from earlier advocate is attached. The order of CIT (A) be kindly cancelled.
2.The initiation of reassessment proceedings is not justified in the light of established case laws & law. Merely on a two line input from AIR, the AO without verification of facts and without enquiry, has recorded reasons merely on doubt/suspicion. This is not correct as held in ITA NO. 3814/Del/11 order dt 28/01/2015, ITA No. 1939/Del/2016 dt 10/02/2017, ITA No. 123 to 125/Lkw/2017 dt 30/11/2018, ITA No. 3534/Del/2014 dt 15/09/2016 etc. Also kindly consider Meenakshi Overseas (P) Ltd 395 ITR 677, G & G Pharma 384 ITR 147 (DHC) etc.
3.The approval by PCIT u/s 151 is also mechanical, routine and rubber stamping of proposal as there was no evidence on the file of AO to support the proposal to justify the same. Law expects senior officer to judiciously consider the proposal, efforts made by AO & evidences collected and then only the approval must be granted. For such faulty approval, the initiation of reassessment be kindly quashed.
4.Sources of cash deposit into bank a/c were explained before the AO from sale of agricultural land for Rs. 40 lakh and for balance Rs. 23,59,000 loan from various persons. The asst, order is silent for explanation given and only for filmsy reasons, did not accept Rs. 40 lakh as source for bank deposit.
5.The appeal now filed before ITAT, Delhi is late by approx 14-15 months as no order of CIT (A) was ever received. The present counsel searched about the status of pending appeal for this year and found the Copy of CIT (A) order dt 21/10/24 This appeal is filed immediately thereafter with an application for condonation of delay and affidavit on oath from the appellant. It is prayed that the delay be kindly condoned and the appeal be kindly heard on merits.
Brief facts of the case are that an information was received that the above assessee has deposited Rs.1,00,00,000/- in his savings bank account. Thereafter, the case was re-opened u/s.147 with prior approval of Pr. CIT, Faridabad as conveyed vide her officer letter 22.03.2018. The notice u/s.148 was issued on 27.03.2018 and duly served upon the assessee through speed post. In response to notice u/s.148, the assessee has submitted his ITR and required to provide copy of reasons recorded to him. The copy of reasons for issue of notice u/s.148 was provided of AR to the assessee. Thereafter, notices u/s. 143(2) and 142(1) were issued to the assessee on 01.10.2018 fixing the case for 08.10.2018 but no compliance was made.
The Ld. CIT(A) has dismissed the appeal of the assessee for non-prosecution. The Ld. DR pointed out that nine opportunities were given to the assessee on fixing the case on different dates starting from December 2020 to October, 2024 but the assessee never complied with the notices issued by the Ld. CIT(A).
We have considered the findings given by the Ld. CIT(A) in the appellate order. We have also heard the Ld. DR. We find that the notices issued by the Ld. CIT(A) are online notices that might have missed the attention of the assessee, therefore, in our considered view keeping the natural justice the assessee deserves one more opportunity as required under law. Accordingly, we are inclined to remand this issue to the file of the Ld. CIT(A) with a direction to give adequate opportunity to the assessee of being heard. The assessee is also directed to comply with the notices/ querries raised by the Ld. CIT(A) and not to take any unnecessary adjournment.
In the result, the appeal of the assessee is allowed for statistical purposes.