The Ahmedabad Bench of Income Tax Appellate Tribunal (ITAT) held that non-cooperation of assessee’s Tax consultant in furnishing details of investment in property leads to income tax addition by Assessing Officer, thus the bench restored the matter to the file of the Commissioner of Income Tax (Appeals) [CIT (A)] for de novo consideration.
The assessee in the present case is Pravinchandra Naranbhai Patel, the original return of income was filed declaring total income of Rs. 3.67 lakhs. Thereafter proceedings under Section 147 of the Income Tax Act, 1961 were initiated, in response to which the assessee filed certain details.
The AO did not agree with the contentions/submissions filed by the assessee and held that the assessee had made investments in two properties, the source of which remained unexplained. Accordingly he made an addition of Rs.74.27 lakhs to the returned income of the assessee by treating the unexplained investment as his unaccounted income.
Aggrieved by the order the assessee filed an appeal before the CIT (A), which passed an ex parte order in absence of any appearance/furnishing of information by the assessee and the order passed by the assessing officer was confirmed. Further aggrieved the assessee filed an appeal before the Tribunal.
The assessee filed an affidavit and submitted detailed information including the source of funds for the investments in properties as well as objections to issuance of notice for reassessment proceedings were filed before the assessing officer during the course of reassessment proceedings.
It has been submitted by the assessee that the consultant appointed by him did not furnish complete information due to certain disputes between the assessee and his consultant and it was due to the assessee’s consultant’s non-cooperation before the AO and also before the CIT(A) that the assessee could not furnish the details in relation to investment in property, to the satisfaction of the Revenue Authorities.
The assessee further stated that he has changed his consultant and if given an opportunity, the necessary compliance with the Tax Department shall be made.
The Bench comprising of Waseem Ahmed, Accountant Member & Siddhartha Nautiyal, Judicial Member in view of the contentions made by the assessee, restored the matter to the file of CIT(A) for de novo consideration, after giving due opportunity of hearing to the assessee.
Hence, the appeal of the assessee was allowed for statistical purposes.
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