MANJINDER SINGH,CHANDIGARH vs. ITO WARD 5 (5), CHANDIGARH

That the impugned order is bad both on facts and law.

That the Ld. Appellate Authority passed an ex-party order without allowing opportunity of being heard against he principles of natural justice and AO wrongly and illegally made additions under section 68 without having been able to understand the vital structure and the accounting entries and without fully and comprehensively understanding the case. 3. That the Ld. AO has wrongly and illegally made addition of Rs. 42,00,000/- ignoring the pleadings on record and against the facts and circumstances of the case and without appreciating the surrounding circumstances and human probabilities. 4. That the Ld. AO has wrongly and illegally made addition of Rs. 26,98,791/- after ignoring the fill facts of the case and without appreciating the accounts, necessity and technique subsequently to be rectified and corrected by appellant. 5. That the interest u/s 234A, 234B, 234C and 234D have been wrongly and illegally charged. 6. That the appellant craves permission to add, amend, elucidate any ground of appeal at the time of hearing.”

During the course of hearing, Ld. AR submitted that an ex-parte order was passed u/s 250 dated 09.06.2023 bearing DIN No: ITBA/NFAC/S/250/2023- 24/1053633599(1) rejecting the ground of appeal of the appellant and upholding the addition made by the Ld AO in its order u/s 143(3) of the Income Tax Act, 1961 dated 21.11.2016. 3.1 It was submitted by the ld AR that the appeal was earlier fixed before CIT(A), Chandigarh in physical mode then the same was transferred to Faceless Appeals Centre under the Faceless regime implemented by CBDT after which notices on e-mail were not received by the assessee nor any physical notice was received. In Form 35, where credentials of the party is filled, it is specifically asked 'Whether notices/communication may be sent on email?' and the assessee has mentioned 'No'. So, as per our understanding, the department was obligated to send the notices physically where it is specifically denied by the assessee that notices on e-mail should not be sent. But no physical notice for fixation of the appeal was received by the assessee.

The ld Sr DR was heard who has relied on the order passed by the lower authorities. On the question of remand due to medical challenges, he submitted that the matter may be appropriately decided by the Bench.

We have heard the rival contentions and purused the material available on record. The fact that during the time the assessment proceedings were underway, the assessee was under severe medical challenges in his family due to ill health of his mother as well as brother who unfortunately expired is also borne out of assessee’s submissions before the AO as well as the statement of facts submitted before the ld CIT(A) which the latter has also acknowledged. During the course of hearing, the ld Sr Dr also didn’t disputed the said fact. We therefore find that the assessee has reasonable cause for not properly representing his matter before the AO which has resulted in passing of the assessment order and consequent demand. As far as appellate proceedings before the ld CIT(A) is concerned, we find from perusal of records that though initial notices were served on the assessee and were complied with, however, once the matter was transferred to CIT(A), NFAC, apparently, the assessee didn’t receive any notices as so claimed and not specifically disputed by the ld DR, resulting in passing of the ex-parte order and dismissal of the appeal on account of non-prosecution. In ordinary circumstances, we would have remanded the matter to the file of the ld CIT(A), however, in the peculiar facts and circumstances of the present case especially where additional evidences are sought to be adduced and which would require necessary verification, we find that it would be appropriate to remit the matter back to the file of the AO to consider the additional evidences as so sought to be submitted by the assessee and allow the assessee to represent his case and basis examination thereof, the matter be decided on merits afresh as per law. In the result, we set- aside the matter to the file of the AO and appeal of the assessee is allowed for statistical purposes.

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