MANAGING COMMITTE SHRI ATMANAND JAIN KANYA UCCH VIDYALAYA,AMBALA CITY vs. ITO EXEMPTIONS WARD AMBALA, ITO EXEMPTIONS WARD AMBALA

This is an appeal filed by the Assessee against the order of the Ld. CIT(A)/NFAC, Delhi dt. 18/06/2024 pertaining the Assessment Year 2017-18.

In the present appeal, the Assessee has raised the following grounds of appeal: 1. “That authorities below have erred in law and facts in denying the exemption u/s 10(23C)(iiiad) to Assessee running Schools.

During the course of hearing, the Ld. AR submitted that assessment in case of the assessee was completed ex-parte by NFAC vide order passed u/s 144 r.w.s 147 of the Income Tax Act dated 19.12.2019. The assessment was done ex-parte due to non- receipt of hearing notices as same were served on an incomplete email id and no physical notice was ever served on assessee during the assessment proceedings.

It was submitted that subsequently, an appeal against such order was filed before ld CIT(A), NFAC on 15.01.2020. While filing the appeal, an email address was given in Form 35 for necessary communication, however, no communication was received on the said email id and the notices were sent on some unknown email id. It was submitted that due to these peculiar facts, where the notices were neither served on the email id nor physically, the assessee couldn’t attend to the appeal proceedings and the ld CIT(A) passed the impugned order due to non-prosecution.

It was submitted that the assessee is very much interested in prosecuting the matter and shall attend to the proceedings and an opportunity may be granted to represent its case on merits and the matter may accordingly be remanded to the AO for de- novo adjudication so that assessee can participate in the proceedings. It was submitted that the assessee has updated correct email ID on the income tax portal as of date and shall ensure full cooperation with income tax authorities for timely disposal of the proceedings.

Per contra, the Ld. DR submitted that the contention of the Ld. AR that the notices have been send on the wrong email id and no physical notices were served during the course of assessment proceedings is not totally correct as the notices were sent through speed post at registered address of the assessee as well and there is nothing on record which has been brought on record by the Ld. AR that the notices sent through Speed Post have been received back undelivered. Further, it was fairly submitted that since there is no findings on the merit, the matter may be set aside for decision on merits.

Heard the rival contentions and purused the material available on record. Though the ld AR has submitted that notices were not received on the email-id at the same time, as pointed out by ld DR, notices, notices were sent through speed post as well. The assessee besides filing its return of income also needs to be diligent in attending to the notices issued by the Revenue authorities. Having said that, as submitted by both the parties, given that the matter was decided ex-parte by both the AO as well as ld CIT(A), the assessee is allowed one more opportunity and matter is remitted to the file of the AO to decide the same afresh as per law after providing reasonable opportunity to the assessee.

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