Chronology

The core issues

• Issue A: Whether an ex-parte, non-response-based rejection (27-Mar-2021) can retroactively be recharacterized five years later as a “rejection on merits” that bars all subsequent applications — especially where the department’s own subsequent conduct (granting the fresh 80G application in Oct-2021, and separately re-granting 12AB registration in Sep-2021) is inconsistent with that recharacterization.
• Issue B: Whether a live approval (valid to AY 2026-27) can be cancelled retroactively without a specific show-cause notice proposing cancellation.
• Issue C: What the newest notice (06-Jul-2026), issued more than three months after the registration it relates to was already granted, actually represents — and how to respond to it without prejudicing other remedies.
• Issue D: Whether pursuing a fresh application under the new Act (13-May-2026) while the cancellation of the old approval remains unchallenged could weaken, waive, or otherwise prejudice a later appeal against that cancellation.

Questions

1. Is it open to a Commissioner to treat a purely non-response-based (ex-parte) rejection as a “rejection on merits” that has “attained finality,” so as to hold a later, distinct fresh application “not maintainable” — particularly where the department itself accepted and approved that fresh application at the time, and separately continued to recognize the trust’s 12A/12AB status without interruption since its original 2019 registration on genuine education/relief-of-poor objects?
2. Can a previously granted Form 10AC be cancelled retroactively, years into its validity, without a specific show-cause notice proposing cancellation and without the applicant being given a chance to respond to that specific proposal? Does the absence of such notice make the cancellation void on natural justice grounds alone, independent of the merits?
3. Given that the 12AB leg of the underlying 23-Mar-2026 Form 10AB has already been approved on 31-Mar-2026, what explains a fresh notice under a new application number invoking section 12AB(1)(b) on the very same filing more than three months later? Is this plausibly linked to a condonation-of-delay request that was bundled into the original filing but not yet separately disposed of, or is a post-grant follow-up notice like this unusual and more likely a portal/clerical artifact worth flagging to the department directly?
4. Does filing a fresh application under the new Act on 13-May-2026 — rather than appealing the cancellation — risk being treated as an implicit acceptance of the cancellation, or as an admission that the earlier approval was indeed invalid? Should the trust be pursuing the ITAT appeal against the 31-Mar-2026 cancellation regardless of, and in parallel with, the new fresh application, to avoid any argument of waiver or acquiescence?
5. What is the correct appellate forum and limitation period for challenging the 31-Mar-2026 retroactive 80G cancellation — is it via ITAT under section 253, and if the 60-day window (running from date of communication, not date of order) has already lapsed by the time the order was actually discovered/downloaded, how is condonation of that delay typically viewed in practice?
6. Practically speaking, should the trust respond substantively to the 06-Jul-2026 notice as though it’s a live, valid proceeding ahead of the 20-Jul-2026 hearing — while separately filing an appeal against the retroactive cancellation — or could responding on the department’s terms be read as conceding that the underlying matter is properly and validly still open?

Grateful for any guidance, similar precedent, or practical experience with CIT(E) offices handling retroactive 10AC cancellations of this nature, especially where the trust’s 12A/12AB status has otherwise been continuous and unbroken since its original 2019 registration on charitable education and poverty-relief objects.