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TMI Blog1985 (9) TMI 124X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... ) of the Act on 19-11-1981. 3. Shri P.T. Sanyal, the learned representative for the assessee, took us through the first of the 10 grounds taken in this appeal which reads as below : "That the order under section 263 passed by the learned Commissioner of Income-tax, in respect of the assessment order dated 19-11-1981 is bad and without jurisdiction since the said assessment order was passed by the Inspecting Assistant Commissioner of Income-tax and not by an Income-tax Officer." Shri P.T. Sanyal urged before us that the Commissioner did not have any jurisdiction to revise under section 263 an order passed by the IAC. According to him, the said jurisdiction of the Commissioner is confined to the orders passed by the ITO only. He referre ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... eferred to the decision in the case of CIT v. Bejoy Kumar Almal [1977] 106 ITR 743 (Cal.) in this connection. In that case it was held that where a provision is enacted for the express purpose of explaining or clearing up issues as to the meaning of a previous enactment, such Explanation should normally govern the earlier Act. Such Explanation is confined to the subject-matter of the prior enactment and the presumption is that it is retrospective. That case was dealing with the Explanation to section 26 of the Act. It may be mentioned that the said Explanation did not state that the law contained therein was being declared for the removal of doubt. Next, he referred to the Board's Circular published at [1984] 150 ITR St. 22. This circular s ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... . In the absence of any such express legislation, he urged that the amendment will take effect only from the date from which the section expressly makes it effective, and not with effect from any prior date. 6. We have considered the contentions of both the parties. The short question that is raised in this ground is whether section 125A(4) empowers the Commissioner to assume jurisdiction under section 263 and revise an assessment order made by the IAC under section 125A(1) even before 1-10-1984? There is no doubt that he can do so after 1-10-1984 because of the coming into force of the Explanation to section 263 with effect from that date. But what is the legal position prior to that date? We find that the case of Bejoy Kumar Almal deals ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... ter Explanation was given prospective effect from a future date, yet both were clarificatory in nature in order to remove doubts recognised by the Legislature as existing prior to the amendment by the very language of the amendments and both the Explanations were given effect to from specific dates. In our opinion, it is significant that these Explanations were given effect from specific dates. In short contrast to the above position, we find that section 4 of the Finance Act, 1983, states that 'the following clause shall be inserted and shall be deemed always to have been inserted...'. It is, therefore, clear that the intention of the Legislature while enacting section 4 was that the said amendment would have retrospective effect not from ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... ference to the ITO in the Act shall be deemed to be reference to the IAC. However, the sub-section does not end there. It goes on to say that in such cases, the IAC making the assessment need not obtain the prior approval of the IAC whenever any other provisions of the Act require such approval to be obtained. It may be that the purpose of section 125A(4) was only to avoid the assessing IAC to obtain prior approval from himself and not for conferring jurisdiction on the Commissioner for the purpose of section 263. The doubt which existed prior to the amendment might be the above doubt or any other doubt. It is not necessary for us to find out in what way section 125A(4) left a doubt vis-a-vis the jurisdiction of the Commissioner under secti ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X
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