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Facts
The assessee filed an income tax return declaring a total income of Rs. 9,53,340/- for AY 2017-18. The Assessing Officer (AO) added Rs. 12,11,093/- on account of credit card payments and exempt agricultural income due to the assessee's failure to provide explanations or evidence. The assessee appealed to the CIT(Appeals), who dismissed the appeal ex-parte after multiple opportunities were not utilized by the assessee.
Held
The Tribunal noted that the assessee failed to produce relevant documents during assessment and did not file submissions or appear before the CIT(Appeals). However, to meet the principles of natural justice, the Tribunal set aside the order of the CIT(Appeals) and remitted the matter back.
Key Issues
Whether the CIT(Appeals) was justified in dismissing the appeal ex-parte without providing sufficient opportunity, and whether natural justice principles were followed.
Sections Cited
143(3)
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Income Tax Appellate Tribunal, KOLKATA-PATNA ‘e-COURT’, KOLKATA
Before: Shri Duvvuru RL Reddy, Vice-(KZ)
Date of concluding the hearing: May 22, 2025 Date of pronouncing the order: May 30, 2025 O R D E R
The present appeal is directed at the instance of assessee against the order of ld. Addl./JCIT(Appeals), New Delhi, dated 30th December, 2024 passed for Assessment Year 2017-18.
(A.Y. 2017-2018) Parish Bishwanath Tekriwal 2. Brief facts of the case are that the assessee is an individual, who filed his return of income for the assessment year 2017-18 declaring total income of Rs.9,53,340/-. Asseessee was asked by the ld. Assessing Officer vide show cause notice dated 05/12/2019 to show as to why total payments made towards credit card purchase & exempt agricultural income should not be added to his total income on the basis of material/data/information available with him. Getting no response from the side of assessee, the ld. Assessing Officer passed the assessment order under section 143(3) on 23.12.2019 by observing that that the assessee has no explanation whatsoever in respect of issues of payments made towards credit card purchase & exempt agricultural income, so the same remains unverified and unexplained due to non-production of explanation/evidences thereof and compelled to complete the assessment on the basis of information available with the record. Finally, the ld. Assessing Officer made an addition of Rs.12,11,093/- on account of payments made towards credit card purchase and exempt agricultural income of the assessee. On being aggrieved, the assessee preferred an appeal before the ld. CIT(Appeals).
The ld. CIT(Appeals) has given several opportunities to the assessee to substantiate his claim, but the appellant neither filed the written submission nor represented the case before the ld. CIT(Appeals). Thereafter the ld. Addl./JCIT(Appeals) dismissed the appeal ex-parte on 30th December, 2024.
At the time of hearing, ld. Counsel for the assessee prayed before the Bench that the impugned order be set aside and remitted back to the file of ld. CIT(Appeals) for deciding it afresh.
At the outset, ld. D.R. brought to my notice that the assessee did not produce the relevant documents as asked by the ld. Assessing Officer during the assessment proceedings. Therefore, the ld. Assessing Officer passed the assessment order by making an addition of Rs.12,11,093/- on account of credit card payments and exempt agricultural income by the assesee. Thereafter the assessee preferred an appeal before the ld. CIT(Appeals). The ld. Addl./JCIT(Appeals) has given many opportunities to the assessee and the assessee neither filed written submission nor any evidence before the ld. Addl./JCIT(Appeals). He further submitted that before the ITAT, the assessee did not substantiate his claim. Therefore, he pleaded to uphold the order passed by the ld. Addl./JCIT(Appeals).
I have heard the rival contentions and perused the material available on record. Considering the facts and circumstances of the case, I am inclined to set aside the order passed by the ld. Addl./JCIT(Appeals) in order to meet the principle of natural justice, and remit the matter back to the file of ld. CIT(Appeals) with a direction to provide one more opportunity of being heard to the assessee. At the same breath, I also hereby caution the (A.Y. 2017-2018) Parish Bishwanath Tekriwal assessee to promptly co-operate with the proceedings before the Ld. CIT(Appeals) failing which the Ld. CIT(Appeals) shall be at liberty to pass appropriate order in accordance with law and merits based on the materials available on the record. Thus, the grounds raised by the assessee are allowed for statistical purposes.
In the result, the appeal of the assessee is allowed for statistical purposes. Order pronounced in the open Court on 30/05/2025.