Dismissing the petitions, that the Directorate of Income-tax (Systems) had made the allocation through automated allocation system to the respective Assessing Officer based on the permanent account number card jurisdiction. Hence, the requirement of automated allocation system had already been duly complied with. The faceless manner means, sending notice electronically by way of “e-proceedings” to the assessee’s registered account through the Income-tax Business Application portal itself, i.e., web portal which is designated and controlled by the Directorate General of Income-tax System). The notices were signed digitally and were sent to the assessee electronically from the web portal of the Income-tax Business Application through the e-proceeding facilities available with the Department through the assessee’s registered account from the web portal of the Income-tax Business Application. All the requirements of the scheme were duly complied with, i.e., the notice had been sent under section 148 in a faceless manner, through automated allocation, in accordance with the risk management strategy formulated by the Board as referred to in section 148A. The Directorate of Income-tax (Systems) selected the cases based on the discrepancies identified-risk management system as referred to in clause (i) of Explanation 1 to section 148. In the absence of specific provisions empowering the Faceless Assessing Officer in terms of section 144B, the power and the jurisdiction of the jurisdictional Assessing Officer could not be taken away as long as a section 148 notice is sent by automated allocation based on a risk management strategy and in a faceless manner in terms of the provisions of the scheme. All the three ingredients had been duly complied with by the Department in issuance of the notice under section 148. Therefore, it could not be construed that the Department had sent the notice under section 148 through the Income-tax Business Application portal not in the faceless manner. If the notices had been sent in a faceless manner, the name of the officer should not be mentioned. Mentioning of the Officer’s name would only be considered as a procedural error and would not vitiate the entire initiation of the proceedings under section 147 and hence, it would not affect the jurisdiction to issue the notice by the Department. Liberty was granted to the assessee to file their reply within a period of 30 days and the authorities were directed to consider the reply and pass orders after affording an opportunity of personal hearing to the assessee. (AY.2023-24)