MADAN MOHAN SHARMA,MEERUT vs. ITO, WARD- 1(4), MEERUT

The appellant, Shri Madan Mohan Sharma (hereinafter referred to as ‘the assessee’) by filing the present appeals, sought to set aside the impugned order all dated 19.06.2018 qua the assessment years 2012-13, 2013-14 & 2015-16 on the identical grounds inter alia that :-

Briefly stated the identical facts for adjudication of all the aforesaid three appeals of assessee pertaining to Assessment Years 2012-13, 2013-14 & 2015-16 at hand are : Assessing Officer reopened the assessment under section 147 of the Income-tax Act, 1961 (for short ‘the Act’) by way of issuing notice u/s 148 of the Act by noticing that the assessee has shown huge agricultural income out of a meager land of 77.3055 bighas which was assessed at Rs.6,18,444/- in AY 2014-15 and the remaining amount of Rs.13,81,556/- claimed as agricultural income was treated as ‘income from other sources’. Assessee has shown agricultural income of Rs.15,00,000/- in AYs 2012-13 & 2013-14 and Rs.20,00,000/- in AY 2015-16. AO, after issuing the notice u/s 148 of the Act and due to non-cooperation of the assessee, proceeded to frame the assessments u/s 144 of the Act in AYs 2012-13, 2013-14 & 2015-16.

Assessee carried the matter by way of an appeal before the ld. CIT (Appeals) who has confirmed the addition by dismissing the appeals. Feeling aggrieved, the assessee has come up in appeals before the Tribunal.

We have heard the ld. Authorized Representatives of the parties to the appeal, gone through the documents relied upon and orders passed by the revenue authorities below in the light of the facts and circumstances of the case.

The ld. AR for the assessee challenged the impugned order passed by ld. CIT (A) on the sole ground that adequate opportunity of being heard is not given to the assessee by the AO and the assessee being bed-ridden due to sickness has failed to defend the assessment and his counsel, Shri R.K. Jain has not appeared before the concerned authorities nor filed any papers nor replied any queries made by the income-tax authorities resulting into assessment orders passed u/s 144/147 of the Act. However, on the other hand, ld. DR for the Revenue defended the impugned orders passed by the AO/ld. CIT (A) on the ground that the assessee himself is not serious to participate in the assessment as well as appellate proceedings, no further opportunity should be granted and relied upon the decision of the ld. CIT (A).

However, the ld. AR for the assessee brought on record documents from pages 1 to 26 of the paper book to prove the medical history of the assessee that he was lying sick since 2008 and has been constantly getting treatment from different Doctors which show that assessee was lying sick. Even, the perusal of the assessment orders passed by the AO shows that only one notice u/s 148 of the Act was issued and claimed to have regularly sent letters to the assessee but without procuring his presence, AO proceeded to frame the assessments u/s 144 of the Act stating that the case is time barred in nature and after estimating the agricultural income of the assessee, assessed the remaining income from other sources.

Bare perusal of the assessment order as well as orders passed by the ld. CIT (A) go to prove that adequate opportunity of being heard has not been given to the assessee by the AO and during the appellate proceedings, counsel engaged by the assessee has not provided any documents to the ld. CIT (A) to reach at the logical conclusion. We are of the considered view that because of inefficiency or negligence of the counsel, the assessee cannot be made to suffer and he should be given adequate opportunity to defend his case who is admittedly owner of agricultural land measuring 77.3055 bighas and it is for the assessee to explain as to what crops he was growing and what was his income because agricultural income depends upon various reasons as sometimes a farmer is engaged in sowing and reaping the cash crops and his income used to be more and in case the farmer is into sowing the seasonal crop like wheat and paddy, his income certainly would be less.

Resultantly, all the three appeals filed by the assessee are allowed for statistical purposes. Order pronounced in open court on this 29th day of January, 2019.