In a recent ruling, the Ahmedabad bench of the Income Tax Appellate Tribunal ( ITAT ) restored the file in which penalty was imposed on the assessee for fresh adjudication due to procedural lapses and lack of hearing opportunity to the assessee.
In this case, the assessing officer (AO) passed an assessment order in which he levied a penalty under Section 271(1)(c) of the Income Tax Act, 1961.
The Commissioner of Income Tax (Appeals) [ CIT( A ) ] dismissed the appeal filed by the assessee, considering the appeal filed by the assesee as non-maintainable and not condoning the delay in filing the appeal before it.
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The assessee, who was aggrieved by the above order of CIT(A) appealed before the ITAT for relief.
It was submitted by the assessee’s counsel that the appeal of the assessee in quantum proceedings was still pending before the CIT(A) and the penalty appeal had been decided in advance.
The ITAT observed that the CIT(A) did not provide the assessee any opportunity for hearing while not condoning the delay.
It was observed by the ITAT that “the Ld.CIT(A) has considered merely the submissions filed by the assessee, along with the appeal, giving reasons for the delay, and passed an order refusing to condone the delay.”
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Due to the pending of the quantum proceedings before the CIT(A), the bench restored the issue back to the file of the CIT(A) and was of the opinion that it would be appropriate to decide the penalty appeal only after the quantum proceeding is decided and to consider condonation of delay only after giving proper opportunity of hearing to the assessee.
The ITAT, comprising Siddhartha Nautiyal ( Judicial Member ) and Annapurna Gupta ( Accountant Member ) allowed the appeal filed by the assessee for statistical purposes.
The assessee was represented by M.S. Chhajed, AR, and the revenue was represented by B.P. Srivastava, Sr. DR.
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