TRADESWIFT BROKING PVT. LTD.,JAIPUR vs. ITO, WARD 2(2), JAIPUR, JAIPUR

The captioned appeal filed by the Assessee, pertaining to assessment year 2009-10, is directed against the order passed by the ld. Commissioner of Income Tax(Appeals)-2, Kolkata in Appeal No. 211/CIT(A)-2/2014-15 dated 31.03.2016 which in turn arises out of an order passed by the AO u/s 144 of the Income Tax Act 1961, (hereinafter referred to as the ‘Act’), dated 27.12.2011.

Brief facts qua the assessee are that the assessee filed its return of incomefor assessment year 2009-10 on 30.09.2009showing total income of 6,09,360/-. The assessee’s case was selected for scrutiny u/s 143(2) of 2 Tradeswift Broking Pvt. Ltd. the Act and the Assessing Officer completed the assessment by making addition based on estimate on account of various expenses.

Aggrieved from the order of the Assessing Officer, the assessee filed an appeal before the Commissioner of Income-tax (Appeal), who has confirmed the addition made by the Assessing Officer. The Ld. CIT(A) issued notice dated 04.10.2012 for fixing the case for hearing on 29.11.2012 but assessee did not appear before him. The Ld. CIT(A) furtherissued the notices dated 12.12.2013, 11.12.2015 and 09.03.2016, but neither the assessee nor his authorized representative appeared before him. Therefore, the Ld. CIT(A) passed the ex parte order.

Against the said ex parte order of the ld. CIT(A), the assessee is in appeal before us and prayed to the Bench to send the matter back to the file of the Assessing Officer to make assessment afresh. The Ld. Counsel stated before us that the jurisdiction of the assessee was transferred to ITO Ward-2(2), Jaipur from ITO Ward-4(3), Kolkata u/s 127(2) of the Income Tax Act, on 02.02.2012 therefore, the order passed by the Ld. CIT(A) is without jurisdiction. Further, the Ld. Counsel stated that the order passed by the Ld. CIT(A) is without giving any reasonable opportunity of being heard to the assessee. In addition to this, in case of ex parte assessment, the Ld. CIT(A) should have considered the merit of the case and the material available before him to adjudicate the issue but in fact the Ld. CIT(A) did not consider the same.

On the other hand, ld DR for the Revenue has primarily reiterated the stand taken by the Ld CIT(A), which we have already noted in our earlier para and is not being repeated for the sake of brevity.

We have heard both the parties and perused the material available on record, we are of the view that this issue requires afresh examination at the end of the Ld. Assessing Officer. Therefore, we remit the matter back to the file of the Ld. AO to make the assessment afresh after giving an adequate opportunity of being heard to the assessee. Accordingly, we allow this appeal for statistical purposes.