Jurisdictional defect in reassessment notice to a deceased assessee invalidates proceedings when all legal representatives are not served.

Notice for reassessment of a deceased assessee's income must be served on all known executors or legal representatives under section 34 read with section 24B(2), because such notice is a jurisdictional condition precedent. Service on only one representative does not amount to proper representation of the estate where several executors exist, and participation by one heir does not cure the defect. On that basis, the reassessment proceedings were treated as void and the consequential recovery notices were also unsustainable, while a separate statutory challenge to recovery was left open.

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Issues: Whether reassessment proceedings under section 34 of the Indian Income-tax Act were invalid when notice was issued only to one of several executors and legal representatives of a deceased assessee, and whether the resulting reassessment orders and recovery steps could be sustained.

Analysis: Section 24B(2) required service of notice on the executor, administrator or other legal representative of a deceased person before the Income-tax Officer could proceed to assess the deceased's income. Read with section 34, the notice was not a mere formality but a condition precedent to jurisdiction. Where the department knew that there were several executors and legal representatives, service on only one of them did not amount to proper representation of the estate. The presence of other executors could not be ignored, and the defect in notice was not cured by the fact that one heir appeared and participated. The reassessment was therefore founded on an invalid notice, and the assessments made on that basis were void. The recovery notices issued under the Madras Revenue Recovery Act, being consequential to those invalid reassessment orders, also could not stand. The challenge to recovery on some other statutory footing was expressly left undecided.

Conclusion: The notice under section 34 was invalid for want of notice to all the executors and legal representatives, and the reassessment orders and consequential recovery proceedings were liable to be quashed in favour of the assessee.

Ratio Decidendi: In reassessment of a deceased assessee's income, notice under section 34 read with section 24B(2) must be served on all known executors or legal representatives so as to effect proper representation of the estate; service on only one of several such representatives is a jurisdictional defect rendering the reassessment void.

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