{"id":5880,"date":"2012-11-06T04:12:49","date_gmt":"2012-11-06T04:12:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/itatonline.org\/archives\/?p=5880"},"modified":"2012-11-06T04:12:49","modified_gmt":"2012-11-06T04:12:49","slug":"fiat-india-automobiles-ltd-vs-acit-bombay-high-court-disgraceful-deplorable-conduct-of-acit-cit-in-seeking-to-circumvent-the-law-strongly-condemned","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/itatonline.org\/archives\/fiat-india-automobiles-ltd-vs-acit-bombay-high-court-disgraceful-deplorable-conduct-of-acit-cit-in-seeking-to-circumvent-the-law-strongly-condemned\/","title":{"rendered":"Fiat India Automobiles Ltd vs. ACIT (Bombay High Court)"},"content":{"rendered":"<table width=\"150\" border=\"0\" align=\"right\">\n<tr>\n<td><a href=\"https:\/\/itatonline.org\/archives\/?dl_id=896\" onclick=\"if (event.button==0) \r\n     setTimeout(function () { window.location = 'http:\/\/itatonline.org\/downloads.php?varname=dl_id=896&varname2=fiat_deplorable_conduct_department.pdf'; }, 100)\" ><strong>Click here to download the judgement (fiat_deplorable_conduct_department.pdf) <\/strong> <\/a><\/p><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n<p><strong><br \/>\n&#8220;Disgraceful &#038; Deplorable Conduct&#8221; of ACIT &#038; CIT in seeking to circumvent the law strongly condemned<br \/>\n<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Pursuant to the assessee&#8217;s request, the CIT passed an order dated 22.11.2011 u\/s 127(2) transferring the assessee&#8217;s case from Mumbai to Pune. Despite the said transfer, the ACIT, Mumbai, issued a s. 148 notice seeking to reopen the assessee&#8217;s case. The assessee filed a Writ Petition to challenge the reopening on the ground that the ACIT, Mumbai, had no jurisdiction. Before the Court, the department revealed that the ACIT had written a letter to the CIT requesting that the transfer of the case be cancelled &#8220;<em>to circumvent any jurisdictional issue<\/em>&#8221; and that the CIT had passed a &#8220;<em>corrigendum   order<\/em>&#8221; stating that the transfer order was &#8220;<em>temporarily   withdrawn   for   the   sake   of administrative convenience<\/em>&#8220;. The said &#8220;corrigendum   order&#8221; was passed without hearing the assessee and even a copy thereof was not served on the assessee. HELD by the Court allowing the Petition:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>The conduct of the ACIT &#038; CIT  is <strong>highly deplorable<\/strong>.  Once   the  jurisdiction  to  assess  the assessee was  transferred from Mumbai to Pune, it was <strong>totally improper<\/strong> on the part of ACIT Mumbai to request the CIT to pass a corrigendum order with a view to <strong>circumvent<\/strong>  the  jurisdictional   issue. Making this request was in <strong>gross abuse of the process of law<\/strong>.  If there was any time barring issue, the ACIT Mumbai ought to have asked   his   counterpart at Pune to   whom   the jurisdiction was transferred to take appropriate steps in the matter instead of taking steps to circumvent the jurisdictional issue. It does <strong>not befit<\/strong> the ACIT Mumbai to <strong>indulge in circumventing<\/strong> the provisions of law and his conduct has to be <strong>strongly condemned<\/strong>. Instead   of   bringing   to   book   persons   who circumvent the provisions of law, the ACIT has himself indulged in circumventing the  provisions of law which is <strong>totally disgraceful<\/strong>. The CIT ought not  to have succumbed to the unjust demands of the ACIT and   ought   to   have   <strong>admonished<\/strong>   the ACIT for making such an <strong>unjust<\/strong> request. The CIT ought to have known that there is no  provision under the Act which empowers the CIT to temporarily withdraw the order passed by him u\/s 127(2)   for   the   sake   of administrative   convenience   or   otherwise.   If   the CIT was honestly of the opinion that the order passed u\/s 127(2) was required   to   be   recalled   for   any   valid   reason, he ought to have issued notice to that effect to the assessee and passed an order after hearing it. Further, though the CCIT agrees that the actions of the CIT and ACIT are <strong>patently unjustified<\/strong> and not as per law, he has expressed his <strong>helplessness<\/strong> in the matter.   It is expected that the CCIT shall take immediate remedial steps to ensure that no such incidents occur in the future.   The department shall pay <strong>costs<\/strong> of Rs. 10,000 which may be <strong>recovered<\/strong> from the CIT &#038; ACIT. <\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><!--\n\n\n\n\n\n\/\/--><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The conduct of the ACIT &#038; CIT  is <strong>highly deplorable<\/strong>.  Once   the  jurisdiction  to  assess  the assessee was  transferred from Mumbai to Pune, it was <strong>totally improper<\/strong> on the part of ACIT Mumbai to request the CIT to pass a corrigendum order with a view to <strong>circumvent<\/strong>  the  jurisdictional   issue. Making this request was in <strong>gross abuse of the process of law<\/strong>.  If there was any time barring issue, the ACIT Mumbai ought to have asked   his   counterpart at Pune to   whom   the jurisdiction was transferred to take appropriate steps in the matter instead of taking steps to circumvent the jurisdictional issue. It does <strong>not befit<\/strong> the ACIT Mumbai to <strong>indulge in circumventing<\/strong> the provisions of law and his conduct has to be <strong>strongly condemned<\/strong>. Instead   of   bringing   to   book   persons   who circumvent the provisions of law, the ACIT has himself indulged in circumventing the  provisions of law which is <strong>totally disgraceful<\/strong>. The CIT ought not  to have succumbed to the unjust demands of the ACIT and   ought   to   have   admonished   the ACIT for making such an unjust request. The CIT ought to have known that there is no  provision under the Act which empowers the CIT to temporarily withdraw the order passed by him u\/s 127(2)   for   the   sake   of administrative   convenience   or   otherwise.   If   the CIT was honestly of the opinion that the order passed u\/s 127(2) was required   to   be   recalled   for   any   valid   reason, he ought to have issued notice to that effect to the assessee and passed an order after hearing it. Further, though the CCIT agrees that the actions of the CIT and ACIT are <strong>patently unjustified<\/strong> and not as per law, he has expressed his <strong>helplessness<\/strong> in the matter.   It is expected that the CCIT shall take immediate remedial steps to ensure that no such incidents occur in the future.   The department shall pay <strong>costs<\/strong> of Rs. 10,000 which may be <strong>recovered<\/strong> from the CIT &#038; ACIT<\/p>\n<div class=\"read-more\"><a href=\"https:\/\/itatonline.org\/archives\/fiat-india-automobiles-ltd-vs-acit-bombay-high-court-disgraceful-deplorable-conduct-of-acit-cit-in-seeking-to-circumvent-the-law-strongly-condemned\/\">Read more &#8250;<\/a><\/div>\n<p><!-- end of .read-more --><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5880","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-all-judgements","category-high-court"],"acf":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/itatonline.org\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5880","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/itatonline.org\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/itatonline.org\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/itatonline.org\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/itatonline.org\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5880"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/itatonline.org\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5880\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/itatonline.org\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5880"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/itatonline.org\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5880"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/itatonline.org\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5880"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}