TMI Blog1999 (11) TMI 23X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... Tribunal was justified in law in holding that the Income-tax Officer was justified in initiating reassessment proceedings under section 147(a) of the Income-tax Act, 1961 ? 2. Whether, on the facts and in the circumstances of the case, the Income-tax Appellate Tribunal was justified in law in restoring the matter to the Appellate Assistant Commissioner to decide on merits the question of includibility of the remuneration payable to the assessee for the assessment year 1964-65 as a trustee of the Sherwani Charitable Trust ?" In Income-tax Reference No. 285 of 1981, the following questions arising out of the Tribunal's order dated December 12, 1980, in ITA Nos. 1864, 1865 and 1866 of Allahabad of 1979 for the assessment years 1965-66, 196 ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... a communication dated March 28, 1973, from the Income-tax Officer, "A" Ward, Allahabad, that it had been held in the case of another trustee that such remuneration was taxable. On receipt of the said information, the Assessing Officer proposed to reopen the assessee's assessments under section 147(a) of the Income-tax Act, 1961, and issued notices under section 148 of the Act after obtaining sanction from the Commissioner of Income-tax. In pursuance of the notices under section 148, the assessee returned the income that had originally been assessed and contended that there was no income by way of remuneration from the aforesaid trust. The Income-tax Officer did not discuss the details for his reasons to assume that there was an income by wa ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... rly erred and it is of no consequence in this connection that the reopening was done by the Income-tax Officer on receipt of information from another Income-tax Officer. So long as, it can be shown that the original return filed by the assessee did not contain information with regard to remuneration derivable by the assessee from Shervani Charitable Trust, the failure would be of the assessee and reopening under section 147(a) alone would be possible. We, therefore, reverse the order of the learned Appellate Assistant Commissioner and restore the case back to him to determine the includibility or otherwise of the income from the aforesaid source in the assessee's total income on merits." For the other years, the Tribunal followed its orde ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... was that all the facts were on the assessment records of the assessee for the earlier years and were in the knowledge of the Revenue and it had already been held in several assessment orders that the assessee did not derive any income by way of remuneration from the said trust and no such income was taxable in the hands of the assessee and, therefore, there was no obligation on the assessee to disclose these facts over and over again in the various following years. We have reproduced the relevant portion of the Tribunal's order to show that although the Appellate Assistant Commissioner had mentioned that the material facts were already on record and had been considered in the assessment for the assessment years 1957-58, 1958-59 and 1959-60 ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... C), though the assessee did not disclose certain transactions evidenced by certain drafts, the officer himself discovered the facts relating thereto but by oversight did not bring the amounts represented by certain bank drafts to tax as the income of the appellant. Subsequently, the Income-tax Officer initiated action under section 147(a) of the Income-tax Act, 1961, with a view to assess the amounts as the appellant's income from undisclosed sources. The Supreme Court held that in such circumstances action under section 147(a) could not be taken. In our view, therefore, the question of taxability of the assumed amount of remuneration having been thrashed out in the earlier assessment years and there being no change in the circumstances, it ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X
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