SHRI POONARAM JITAJI CHOUDHARY,PANVEL vs. NATIONAL FACELESS APEEAL CENTRE (NFAC), DELHI, DELHI

Briefly, the facts of the case are as under: The appellant is an individual. The return of income for the assessment year 2013-14 was filed by the assessee on 29.03.2014 declaring income of Rs.4,10,590/-. Subsequently, the Assessing Officer on receipt of the information that the appellant had taken loan of Rs.3.5 crore from Aasharamji Ashram, Motera, Sabarmati, Ahmedabad, out of which a sum of Rs.31.5 lakh was repaid in cash during the previous year relevant to the year under consideration, had issued notice u/s 148 of the Act. Against the same, the AO completed the assessment ex parte u/s 144 of the Act after making addition of Rs.31.5 lakh treating the said sum as unexplained income of the assessee u/s 69A of the Act.

Being aggrieved with the above order, an appeal was filed before the CIT(A) who vide impugned order confirmed the action of the AO. Before the CIT(A), the assessee took a plea that the AO passed the ex parte order without giving reasonable opportunity of being heard. However, the CIT(A) has rejected the plea of the assessee on the ground that despite giving numerous opportunities, the appellant chosen not to file any written submissions or details, accordingly confirmed the action of AO.

I had carefully gone through the assessment order as well as the order of CIT(A). In para 5 of the assessment order, the AO had set out the dates of hearing u/s 143(2) of the Act and the dates given for compliance of the said notices. On mere perusal of para 5 of the assessment order, it would clearly reveal that the AO had not given reasonable opportunity as in each hearing notice, the time granted to respond the notice was less than one week, which is unreasonable. Therefore, I am of the considered opinion that the AO had not granted a reasonable opportunity to represent the matter before the AO and therefore, the matter is restored to the file of AO with a direction to frame the assessment de novo after affording the opportunity of being heard to the appellant.

In the result, the appeal filed by the assessee is allowed for statistical purposes.