Strict limitation for rectification orders means the final order must be made within time, not just the notice or proceedings.

Section 37(7) of the Karnataka Agricultural Income-tax Act requires a rectification order to be made within four years from the date of the original order, and the provision is mandatory because it is framed in negative terms. Mere issuance of a show-cause notice or initiation of rectification proceedings within the four-year period does not satisfy the statute if the final order is passed later. On that construction, a rectification order made after expiry of four years is barred by limitation, without jurisdiction, and illegal, and any consequential demand notice founded on it is unsustainable.

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Issues: Whether the rectification order made under section 37(7) of the Karnataka Agricultural Income-tax Act, 1957 was barred by limitation and consequently without jurisdiction, and whether the consequential demand notice was liable to be quashed.

Analysis: The statutory language of section 37(7) required that no amendment under the section be made after the expiry of four years from the date of the order sought to be amended. The provision was couched in negative terms and therefore had to be construed as mandatory. On a strict reading, the decisive requirement was the making of the rectification order within four years of the original assessment order. The issue of a show-cause notice or the initiation of proceedings within that period could not extend the period of limitation where the statute itself fixed the time for making the order. Since the rectification order was passed beyond four years from the original assessment order, it was time-barred. The consequential demand notice, being founded on the invalid rectification order, could not survive.

Conclusion: The rectification order was barred by limitation, without jurisdiction, and illegal, and the consequential demand notice was also unsustainable.

Ratio Decidendi: Where a statute expressly requires that an amendment or rectification order be made within a specified period from the date of the original order, the limitation runs to the making of the final order itself and not merely to the initiation of proceedings; a negative and time-limiting provision must be strictly construed as mandatory.

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