Section 148A of the Income Tax Act
Income-tax Act, 2025: s.281
Section 148A of the Income-tax Act, 1961 corresponds to section 281 (Procedure before issuance of notice under section 280) of the Income-tax Act, 2025.
Read section 281 of the 2025 Act
Correspondence checked against the ICAI tabular mapping of the two Acts and the BharatTax.co section commentary.
The decision most relied on for Section 148A is Union of India v. Rajeev Bansal (469 ITR 46), cited in 713 of the 3,543 judgments on BharatTax that turn on this section.
Leading authorities on Section 148A
The legal fiction created by the Ashish Agarwal judgment stops the limitation clock for Section 148 notices from the date of the deemed notice. Orders issued without proper jurisdiction, or those inconsistent with statutory prescriptions, are a nullity, and there can be no waiver of such fundamental jurisdictional requirements.
For attracting Section 14A disallowance, there must be a proximate cause relating the expenditure to actual tax-exempt income, and such disallowance is not automatic but requires positive material. Additionally, Section 94(7) on dividend stripping only ignores losses to the extent of dividend received for assessment years post-April 1, 2002, allowing the remaining loss.
Notices issued under the unamended Section 148 of the Income-tax Act between April 1, 2021, and May 4, 2022, must be treated as notices issued under the new Section 148A(b) of the amended law. This requires the Assessing Officer to follow the procedure prescribed under the amended reassessment provisions, including issuing an order under Section 148A(d) before a fresh notice under Section 148.
An order refusing special leave to appeal to the Supreme Court, whether speaking or non-speaking, does not attract the doctrine of merger, meaning the order under challenge is not substituted.
A notice issued under section 148 of the Income Tax Act is invalid if the Income Tax Department fails to follow the prescribed procedures, including obtaining the necessary approvals under section 151 or adhering to the faceless assessment scheme mandates under section 151A.
Circulars issued by the Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) under Section 119 of the Income Tax Act are legally binding on the revenue authorities in their administration and implementation. This binding character applies even if the circulars depart from the correct interpretation of the law and cannot be ignored to the prejudice of the assessee.
The sanction of a specified authority under Section 151 is a mandatory procedural check before issuing a notice under Section 148. This procedural safeguard aims to prevent mechanical reopening of assessments and harassment of the assessee.
The doctrine of merger applies when appellate jurisdiction is invoked, causing the operative part of a lower court's order or decree to merge into the superior court's order, whether it reverses, modifies, or affirms the original decision. The application of this doctrine depends on the nature of the appellate or revisional order, the scope of statutory provisions, and the subject matter challenged.
