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Judgment
SANJEEV SACHDEVA, J. (ORAL)
Issue notice. Notice is accepted by learned counsel appearing for respondent. With the consent of the parties, the petition is taken up for hearing today.
Petitioner impugns order dated 30.12.2023 whereby the proceedings under Section 73 of the Act have been concluded and a demand has been created against the petitioner.
Learned counsel for petitioner submits that Show Cause Notice dated 24.09.2023 was received by the petitioner to which a detailed point-wise reply was submitted.
It is noticed that the order dated 30.12.2023 records that no proper reply/explanation has been received from the tax-payer despite sufficient and repeated opportunities which indicates that the tax-payer has nothing to say in the matter.
The observation in the impugned order dated 30.12.2023 is not sustainable for the reasons that the reply filed by the petitioner is a detailed reply.
The proper officer had to at least consider the reply on merits and then form an opinion whether the explanation was sufficient or not. He merely held that no proper reply/explanation has been received which ex-facie shows that proper officer has not even looked at the reply submitted by the petitioner.
Accordingly, impugned order dated 30.12.2023 is set aside. The matter is remitted to the proper officer for re-adjudication of the show cause notice issued under Section 73 of the Act within four weeks after giving an opportunity of personal hearing to the petitioner.
The petition is accordingly disposed of in the above terms.