A revised return filed by an assessee, to correct the original return which treated loss on F&O transactions as speculative loss, could not be rejected on the ground of ‘change of opinion’. The doctrine of ‘change of opinion’ relied upon by the AO was relevant in the context of reassessment proceedings under section 147/148 of the Act and cannot, by itself, be invoked to curtail the statutory right available to an assessee under section 139(5) to revise a return of income for the purpose of correcting an omission or a wrong statement.

The assessee had disclosed the loss arising from the F&O transactions in the original return itself and had also claimed the said loss for carry forward. The revised return did not introduce a new loss or make a fresh claim for carry forward of an otherwise undisclosed loss. The revision in the return was undertaken to correct the nature of the loss, namely, from speculative business loss to non-speculative business loss.

The reliance of the CIT (A) on the judgement of the Supreme Court in Wipro Ltd. 446 ITR 1 to reject the revised return, was erroneous as in the present case, no new loss was claimed in the revised return but only classification of the loss was changed, unlike in Wipro’s case where the assessee therein had consciously not claimed the exemption in the original return and sought to claim the exemption for the first time through the revised return.