Reasonable opportunity in revised assessment requires notice service and consideration of replies before finalising fresh assessment.

A revised assessment under Section 27(1)(a) of the Tamil Nadu Value Added Tax Act, 2006 must be preceded by a reasonable opportunity to show cause. The assessment was set aside because the record showed one revisional notice had been served and replied to, yet the authority wrongly proceeded as if no reply had been filed to either notice. Fairness required service of the second notice and consideration of the existing reply before any fresh revised assessment. The matter was remitted to the assessing authority to issue the second notice, grant time for response, and pass a fresh order.

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Issues: Whether the revised assessment order was liable to be set aside for having been passed without affording a reasonable opportunity to respond to the revisional notices and whether the matter should be remitted for fresh assessment.

Analysis: The revised assessment was made under Section 27(1)(a) of the Tamil Nadu Value Added Tax Act, 2006, which requires a reasonable opportunity to show cause before a revised assessment is finalised. The record showed that one revisional notice had been served and replied to under acknowledgement, but the assessment order proceeded on the erroneous footing that no reply had been filed to either notice. Since the authority itself had issued a further notice, fairness required that the second notice also be served and the assessee be given an opportunity to respond before a fresh decision was made.

Conclusion: The revised assessment order was set aside on the ground of violation of reasonable opportunity, and the matter was remitted to the assessing authority to resend the second notice, consider the reply to the first notice, afford time to respond, and pass a fresh revised assessment.

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