Reassessment for escaped turnover fails where excess cash and slips do not reasonably prove suppressed sales turnover.

Reassessment jurisdiction under section 16 of the Tamil Nadu General Sales Tax Act, 1959 arises only where there is a reasonable basis to conclude that turnover has escaped assessment. Recovered slips and excess cash balance, without clinching material linking them to suppressed sales turnover or unaccounted profit, did not satisfy that threshold. The dealer's explanation was already available in the original assessments, and the reopening was treated as resting on conjecture and surmise. The revised assessments were therefore held to be without jurisdiction and were quashed.

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Issues: Whether the reassessment proceedings under section 16 of the Tamil Nadu General Sales Tax Act, 1959 were validly initiated on the basis of the recovered slips and excess cash balance, and whether the impugned revised assessments were without jurisdiction.

Analysis: Jurisdiction under section 16 arises only when there is a reasonable basis to conclude that the whole or part of a dealer's turnover has escaped assessment. The excess cash reflected in the slips, by itself, did not establish that the amount represented sales turnover or profit from unaccounted sales. The assessee's explanation had been available at the time of the original assessments, and the record did not contain clinching material showing escapement of turnover. The reopening was therefore founded only on conjecture and surmise, and the assessment was also criticised as arbitrary in the manner in which the alleged excess balance was scaled up.

Conclusion: The reassessment under section 16 was without jurisdiction and the revised assessment orders could not stand.

Final Conclusion: The writ petitions succeeded because the statutory conditions for reopening were not satisfied and the impugned reassessments were quashed.

Ratio Decidendi: Reassessment jurisdiction for escaped turnover can be exercised only on the basis of material reasonably showing that taxable turnover has escaped assessment; mere suspicion or conjecture about excess cash is insufficient.

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