Reopening barred under old income-tax law cannot be revived by later statute where threshold conditions were not shown.

A reopening notice under the 1961 Act could not validly revive an assessment for 1949-50 where the power to reopen had already become barred under section 34 of the 1922 Act before the 1961 Act commenced. The old law permitted reopening after eight years only if escaped income had amounted to, or was likely to amount to, the prescribed threshold, and the materials did not show that condition. The phrase "likely to amount to" was treated as requiring a tentative satisfaction at the notice stage, but that requirement was still not established. Section 297(2)(d)(ii) was therefore not construed as restoring an extinguished reopening power.

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Issues: Whether a notice under section 148 of the Income-tax Act, 1961 could validly reopen an assessment for assessment year 1949-50 when the right to reopen had already become time-barred under section 34 of the Indian Income-tax Act, 1922 before the new Act came into force.

Analysis: The relevant restriction under the old Act was that, after eight years from the expiry of the assessment year, reopening could be made only if the escaped income amounted to, or was likely to amount to, one lakh of rupees or more in the aggregate. On the materials placed before the Court, there was no basis to hold that the escaped income satisfied that threshold. The expression "likely to amount to" was construed as requiring a tentative belief or satisfaction at the stage of issuing notice, but even on that footing the statutory condition was not shown to exist. In these circumstances, the right to reopen had already become barred under the 1922 Act before the 1961 Act commenced, and section 297(2)(d)(ii) could not be read as reviving a power that had already been extinguished.

Conclusion: The notice under section 148 was illegal and invalid, and the challenge succeeded.

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