Section 159 of the Income Tax Act
Income-tax Act, 2025: s.302
Section 159 of the Income-tax Act, 1961 corresponds to section 302 (Legal representative) of the Income-tax Act, 2025.
Read section 302 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 159 is Savita Kapila v. ACIT (118 Taxmann.com 46), cited in 98 of the 280 judgments on BharatTax that turn on this section.
Leading authorities on Section 159
There is no legal requirement for a legal representative to report an assessee's death to the income tax department; consequently, a reassessment notice issued under Section 148 to a deceased person is invalid as it lacks proper jurisdiction.
Section 292B of the Income Tax Act applies only to procedural irregularities and cannot cure fundamental jurisdictional defects, such as the non-issue of a mandatory Section 148 notice for reassessment or framing an assessment against a non-existing or dead person.
A notice under section 148 of the Income-tax Act, 1961, is a jurisdictional notice and a condition precedent for reassessment. Such a notice issued against a deceased person is valid if the legal representative submits to the Assessing Officer without raising any objection.
Income tax proceedings initiated or an assessment order passed in the name of a deceased person are void ab initio, as such proceedings are without jurisdiction. Section 159 of the Income Tax Act does not apply if proceedings were not initiated during the assessee's lifetime.
The same income cannot be assessed substantively in multiple hands. However, this principle does not prevent a single consolidated assessment order for multiple legal representatives.
Assessment and penalty proceedings initiated against a deceased assessee are invalid if not made in the name of their legal heir.
Income should be taxed only once in the hands of the rightful assessee; substantive assessments cannot be made simultaneously on multiple legal heirs.
An omission or defect in serving a notice required by procedural provisions does not invalidate a tax liability created by substantive charging sections, making the assessment irregular but not void.
An assessment or reassessment proceeding initiated or continued against a deceased person after their demise is illegal and void ab initio, as no valid notice can be issued to a dead individual.
Assessment proceedings initiated against a deceased person are void ab initio, and such proceedings cannot be continued against their legal heirs if no notice was served during the assessee's lifetime or on the legal heir as a "deemed assessee" within the prescribed time.
