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Judgment
PER SUDHIR KUMAR, JM:
These are five appeals filed by the same Assessee against the common order of Ld. Commissioner of Income Tax (Appeals-3), Gurgaon (the CIT(A)’ in short) passed u/s 250(6) of the Income Tax Act, 1961 (the Act) dated 7.11.2025 pertaining to AYrs 2010-11 to 2014-15 respectively.
The issues involved in all the appeals are common, interlinked and related to the same assessee, therefore, they have been heard together and accordingly, adjudicated by this common order.
First, we take assessee’s appeal in ITA No. 9032/Del/2025 for AY 2010-11.
The assessee in its appeal has taken as many as 22 grounds, but he only argued the legal ground which reads as under:-
“8(i). On the facts and circumstances of the case, Ld. CIT(A) has erred, both on facts and in law, in confirming the order of the AO despite the fact that the proceedings initiated against the assessee and the assessment framed under section 153C of the Act are in violation of mandatory provisions of Section 153D of the Act and as such the same is bad in eyes of law.
(ii)The purported approval u/s. 153D of the Act is illegal, bad in law and also without any application of mind.
The learned AR of the assessee submitted that additions made by the AO are untenable as company has not executed the project. It was the further contention that the consolidated Satisfaction Note for multiple years is invalid, illegal and bad in law; no seized material referred in Satisfaction Note related to the impugned assessment year, hence, no jurisdiction of AO under section 153C of the Act; assessment order for AY 2014-15 passed u/s. 143(3) /144 is invalid as the same is contrary to section 153C of the Act. Even otherwise, approval granted u/s. 153D on 29.3.2016 (i.e. before 1.4.2021 – the date of retrospective applicability made by Finance Act 2026) is mechanical and without application of mind. It was further submitted that the assessment order has been passed for all the years after obtaining consolidated approval on 29.3.2016 purely in mechanical manner, without application of mind and thus such approval is a non-est in the eyes of law and vitiates the entire assessment itself, as per settled principles of law.
The Ld. DR of the Revenue relied upon the orders of the authorities below and objected to the submissions of the ld. AR.
We note that there arises the first and foremost issue of validity of all the impugned assessments framed u/s 153C of the Act, on the ground that the learned prescribed authority had not accorded a valid approval thereto u/s 153D of the Act. We may reproduce the approval u/s 153D of the Income Tax Act, which read as under:
We find that in the case of ACIT, Circle1(2) vs. M/s Serajudeen and Co., the Hon’ble Supreme Court dismissed the appeal filed by the Department of Revenue against the order dated 15-03-2023 in ITA No. 43/2022 wherein the Hon’ble Orissa High Court in ITA No. 39 to 45/2022 held that:
“22.As rightly pointed out by learned counsel for the assessee there is not even a token mention of the draft orders having been perused by the Additional CIT. The letter simply grants an approval. In other words even the bare minimum requirement of the approving authority having to indicate what the thought process involved was is missing in the aforementioned approval order. While elaborate reasons need not be given, there has to be some indication that the approving authority has examined the draft orders and finds that it meets the requirement of the law. As explained in the above cases the mere repeating of the words of the statute, or mere rubber stamping of the letter seeking sanction by using similar words like see or approved will not satisfied the requirement of law.”
We further find that in the case of Pr. Commissioner of Income Tax -15 v. Shiv Kumar Nayyar the Hon’ble Delhi High Court held that : “17” Notable, the order of approval dated 30-12-2020 which was produced before us by the learned counsel for the assessee clearly signifies that a single approval has been granted for AYs 2011-12 to 2017-18 in the case of the assessee. The said order also fail to make any mention of the fact that the draft assessment orders were perused at all, much less perusal of the same with an independent application of mind. Also, we cannot lose sight of the fact that in the instant case, the concerned authority has granted approval for 43 cases in a single day which is evident from the findings of the ITAT, succinctly encapsulated in the order.
We observe that learned Assessing Officer had sought the prescribed authority’s approval on 23.3.2016 which stood granted on 28.3.2016. The sole issue is that the learned Assessing Officer herein had infact sought a common approval for the assessment years from 2008-09 to 2014-15 which stood granted, and therefore, we quote PCIT Vs. Shiv Kumar Nayyar (2024) 163 taxmann.com 9 (Del.), PCIT Vs. MDLR Hotels (P) Ltd. (2024) 166 taxmann.com 327 (Del.) and ACIT vs. Serajuddin and Co. (2024) 163 taxmann.com 118 (SC), to conclude that such a combined section 153D approval indeed vitiates the entire assessment itself. We draw strong support therefrom to quash all the impugned assessments framed herein in assessee’s case in assessment years 2010-11 to 2014-15 in very terms.
As a result, the assessee’s quantum appeals being ITA Nos. 9032/Del/2025 to 9036/Del/2025 (Ayrs. 2010-11 to 2014-15) involving the corresponding impugned assessment succeed.
To sum up, these assessee’s 05 appeals ITA Nos. 9032 to 9036/Del/2025 are allowed. A copy of this common order be placed in the respective case files.