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Income Tax Appellate Tribunal, AMRITSAR BENCH, AMRITSAR.
Before: DR. M. L. MEENA & SH. ANIKESH BANERJEE
ORDER Per:Anikesh Banerjee, JM: The instant appeal of the assessee was filed against the order of the ld. Commissioner of Income Tax (Appeals) Jammu,[in brevity the ‘CIT (A)’] order passed u/s 250 (6) of the Income Tax Act 1961, [in brevity ‘the Act’] for A.Y. 2002-03.The impugned order was emanated from the order of the ld. Income Tax Officer, Anantnag, [in brevity ‘ the AO’] order passed u/s 144of the Act. 2. The assessee has taken the following grounds:
“1. The Ld. CIT(A) has erred in law and facts by confirming addition of Rs. 8,83,500.00 on a/c of unexplained investment u/s 69 made by the Ld. AO. 2. The Ld. CIT(A) has erred in law and facts by enhancing the assessment on a/c of application of 10% rate of interest on deposits. 3. The Ld. CIT(A) has erred in law and facts by enhancing the assessment without any notice to the appellant. 4. The Appellant reserves the right to amend, alter, add, any grounds of appeal.”
When the appeal was called for hearing, none was present on behalf of the assessee. No adjournment petition was filed with the appeal. The Registry informed that the power of attorney was also not submitted with this appeal. We consider the gravity of the case we proceed to adjudicate the matter ex parte qua for assessee after considering the submission of the ld. DR.
The assessee filed the appeal with delay of 932 days and along with the ground for addition amount to Rs.8,83,500/-, related to section 69. The matter is taken for adjudication as below. 5. Brief fact of the case is that the assessee has made the investment Rs.70,95,120/- under the head ‘Deposits and Savings and GPF’ which was reflected in balance sheet. The addition was made by the ld. AO due to lack explanation. Aggrieved assessee filed an appeal before the ld. CIT(A). The ld. CIT(A) considered the assessee’s submission and restricted the addition amount to Rs.8,83,500/- u/s 69 of the Act for non-submission of evidence related to part investment. The ld. CIT(A) had calculated the interest on investment @10% and recomputed the income of the assessee. The assessee has objection on enhancement of income on account of addition of interest on investment. Aggrieved assessee filed an appeal before us by challenging the order of the ld. CIT(A).
The ld. DR vehemently argued and strongly made objection against the delay for filing of appeal for 932 days. The assessee has filed condonation petition and explained the details for delay in filing the appeal. The reasons was duly extracted as below: “The orders so received by us and the orders of my wife were handed over to the office assistant of our school who was advised for contacting our counsel who can file appeal. Since the assistant has left the services from the school and the orders were retained by him without considering the sensitivity of the matter. Finally on 15/09/2013 our counsel informed us that we have not filed appeal against the order and we tried to see the orders which we could not trace from the locations, the assistant stated he has kept at. Finally on 15/10/2013 we caught hold of the assistant who tried to trace the order which were not found at that time. Finally I felt ill and was advised to shift to hot places and not to live in Kashmir because of Cold weather conditions and we had to shift entire family from Kashmir to Jammu. Finally we shifted back to Kashmir on 13 April 2014 and after settling down in Kashmir our counsel again advised us for filling appeal against the orders and on 22nd of April tried to locate the orders but same were not found. Then in the 2nd week of August we decided to clean up the old record and some how we found the orders at the school premises on 30th of August 2014 and immediately were sent to our counsel for filling of appeal before the honourable bench. On that day our counsel was not available and we retained orders at his home. On 6th of September 2014 it was a massive flood in which entire Kashmir valley was submerged and it was reported by the counsel that the order sent washed away in floods which targeted the home of the counsel. The life in Kashmir is yet to return to normalcy and we could not enquire about filling of appeal by the counsel till 12/06/2015 . On this somehow feeling that the life must have turned normal I called upon the somehow called counsel who informed me about the scene happened with the orders and advised that we need to obtain fresh copies of orders from the office of worthy Commissioner of Income Tax Appeals. The commissioner of Income Tax Appeals was transferred on 15/06/2015 and there was commissioner of Income tax Appeals holding office in Jammu and Kashmir till 02/09/2015 on which date current
CIT(A) was transferred and joined on 22/09/2015. On this date worthy Commissioner of Income Tax joined and we applied for fresh copies of orders and received said orders by our counsel 08/10/2015 and accordingly filed appeal on.”
The assessee respectfully relied on the order of the Hon’ble Apex Court in the case of N.Balakrishnan vs. M. Krishnamurthy, AIR 1998 SC 3222, Held as under: - “11. Rules of limitation are not meant to destroy the right of the parties. They are meant to see that parties do not resort dilatory tactics but seek their remedy promptly. The object of providing a legal remedy is to repair the damage caused by reason of legal injury: Respectfully relied on the order of the Hon’ble Apex Court, we consider the petition for condonation of delay of 932 days. The assessee placed proper reason for delay in filing appeal. The ld. DR has not made any strong objection against the condonation of delay. The delay for 932 days is condoned.
We heard the submission of revenue and relied on the documents available in the record. The assessee was not able to submit the details explanation before the ld. CIT(A). During assessment the assessee was also denied for the opportunity and the assessment was passed u/s 144. There is no such any material for adjudicating the issue on basis of the evidence. Accordingly, we remit back the matter to the ld. CIT(A) for further adjudication of Rs.8,83,500/- related to investment of the assessee and the re-computation of interest on investment.