1961 (6) TMI 14

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..... neral Sales Tax Act, 1957. The petitioner is a dealer in paddy and rice. The final assessment was made for the year 1956-57 by the Deputy Commercial Tax Officer, Bandar. The assessee presented an appeal against this assessment to the Deputy Commissioner of Commercial Taxes, Guntur. Pending the appeal the Special Staff (Evasions) made a surprise inspection of the business premises of the petitioner .....

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..... tent mistake. Disbelieving this plea, the Deputy Commercial Tax Officer levied the penalty, which is now the subject matter of this revision. The petitioner carried appeals unsuccessfully to the Deputy Commissioner of Commercial Taxes and the Sales Tax Appellate Tribunal. In this revision case, the main argument pressed upon us by Dr. Bheemaraju, learned counsel for the petitioner, is that as th .....

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..... at too low a rate, the assessing authority may, at any time within a period of four years from the expiry of the year to which the tax or the licence fee or registration fee relates, assess the tax payable on the turnover which has escaped assessment or levy the correct amount of licence fee or registration fee, after issuing a notice to the dealer and after making such inquiry as he considers ne .....

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..... pay in addition to the tax so assessed, a penalty not exceeding one and half times the amount of that tax, if the turnover had escaped assessment or had been under-assessed or assessed as too low a rate by reason of its not being disclosed by the dealer." To our minds, the expression "such authority" has relation only to the authority which has made the additional assessment. This concept is bro .....

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..... ng authority, who has assessed the escaped assessment, that is competent to levy the penalty. Since the penalty in the present case was levied by an authority other than the one who made the additional assessment, it could not be sustained. Therefore the order levying the penalty has to be set aside as being outside the competence of the Deputy Commercial Tax Officer. In the result, the tax revisi .....

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