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Income Tax Appellate Tribunal, C/“SMC” BENCH, CHENNAI
Before: SHRI CHANDRA POOJARI
आदेश / O R D E R
PER CHANDRA POOJARI, ACCOUNTANT MEMBER:
This appeal is filed by the assessee, aggrieved by the order of the Learned Commissioner of Income Tax(A)-15, Chennai dated 31.05.2016 pertaining to assessment year 2009-10.
The assessee has raised the following grounds for consideration.
1. The Commissioner of Income Tax (Appeals) erred in sustaining an amount of Rs.22,00,000 as undisclosed income without going through the facts.
2. The Commissioner of Income Tax (Appeals) erroneously assumed the income offered in the return of income of the father of appellant as agricultural income, without considering the fact that the credit in the bank account was the income relating to the HUF in which the appellant’s father is the Karta. The agricultural land of 18.11 acres belongs to HUF was ancestral land. 3. The Commissioner of Income Tax (Appeals) ought to have accepted the fact that holding a PAN is not the criteria of existence of the HUF. The HUF had only agricultural income and no income subject to tax.
This appeal is filed by the assessee with a delay of 171 days before this Tribunal. A condonation petition was filed by the assessee dated 21-04-2017 seeking condonation of delay in filing the appeal stating that the assessee changed his auditors during the assessment proceedings and Appellate proceedings, thereby communication gap resulting in a delay. The assessee is a salaried employee, being employed as a chef at the GRT Hotels and not conversant with the timeline relating to the filing of appeals. Then, the assessee approached firm of M/s.Subramanian & Swaminathan, Chartered Accountants on the 13th February 2017 for professional advice. M/s.Subramanian & Swaminathan, Chartered Accountants took immediate steps to file the appeal on 17th February, 2017 before the Tribunal. Hence, the assessee requested the bench to condone the delay in view of the above submissions.
I have carefully gone through the condonation petition filed by the assessee. In my opinion, there exists reasonable cause in not filing the appeal in time as the earlier auditor has not taken any interest in pursuing the appeal before the Ld.CIT(A) as well as filing the appeal before this Tribunal, which forced the assessee to change the Auditor and to choose a new Counsel. Accordingly, the delay is condoned and the appeal is admitted. Since the appeals were dismissed by the Ld.CIT(A) for non-prosecution, the assessee explained that it was due to failure of the Auditor to appear before the Ld.CIT(A), in my opinion, there is a reasonable cause in not appearing before the Ld.CIT(A) by the assessee and accordingly, we remit the issue in dispute to the file of Ld.CIT(A) to decide the issue on merits after giving opportunity to the assessee.
In the result, the appeal of assessee is partly allowed for statistical purposes. Order pronounced on 05th December, 2017.