The Delhi High Court rejected application of Employees Provident Fund Organisation, New Delhi seeking condonation of delay as the court finds no reasonable grounds for allowing condonation of delays in filing returns under section 119(2)(b) of Income Tax Act,1961.
These appeals are filed by Employees Provident Fund Organisation, Regional Office, Delhi seeking to question the order of the Income Tax Appellate Tribunal (ITAT) dated 03 August 2016.
However and as in manifest from the affidavit which has been filed in support of the applications seeking condonation of delay, it was asserted that the counsel entrusted with filing of these appeals had been infected with COVID. So there is an apparent and evident failure to explain the delay in between 2016 and till such time the pandemic came down.
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Although a subsequent affidavit in support of the prayer for condonation of delay has been moved with CM APPL.53208/2022, the court noted that also the same miserably and abjectly fails to explain the inordinate delay of 1427 days. All that the affidavit refers is to exchange of correspondence between the counsel engaged and certain officers of the appellant-organization.
The Division bench comprising Justice Yashwant Varma and Justice Ravinder Dudeja observed that they found no ground to condone the delay and the appeals filed by the petitioners stands dismissed.
In light of the order on the main applications seeking condonation of delay, these applications shall stand disposed of.
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Also due to dismissal of the delay applications, the appeals also shall stand consigned to the record.
The question of law sought to be canvassed in appeals are kept open to be addressed in appropriate proceedings.
The Respondent, Deputy Commissioner of Income Tax (DCIT) and Assistant Commissioner of Income Tax (ACIT) was represented by Mr. Sanjay Kumar, Ms. Easha, Mr. Aseem Chawla, SSC with Ms. Pratishtha Chaudhary, Advocates.
The Petitioner was represented by Mr. Siddharth, SC, Mr. Anshul Saxena and Mr. Harshit Manwani, Mr. Vikramajit Banerjee, ASG Mr. Rony O John, Mr. Piyush Swami and Mr. Arshdeep Singh, Advocates.
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