Finality of assessment order under Rule 68B starts limitation for sale proclamation only after special leave dismissal.

For Rule 68B of the Second Schedule to the Income-tax Act, limitation for sale of attached immovable property runs from the end of the financial year in which the assessment order becomes truly final, meaning it can no longer be set aside, modified, or revised. Where the assessment order was still open to Supreme Court interference until the special leave petition was dismissed, finality was reached only on that dismissal. On that basis, the three-year period began from 31 March 2016, and the sale proclamation issued in June 2018 fell within time. The ancillary objection based on the second certificate did not change the result.

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Issues: Whether the proclamation of sale was barred by limitation under Rule 68B of the Second Schedule to the Income-tax Act, 1961, and whether the assessment order attained finality only on dismissal of the special leave petition.

Analysis: Rule 68B(1) requires the three-year period to be reckoned from the end of the financial year in which the order giving rise to the demand becomes conclusive or final. The relevant question was when finality attached to the assessment order. The assessment order had been carried in appeal before the High Court and thereafter challenged before the Supreme Court by special leave. Finality, for the purposes of Rule 68B, meant the point at which the order could no longer be set aside, modified, or revised. Since the Supreme Court could still have interfered with the assessment order, finality was reached only when the special leave petition was dismissed. That dismissal fell in the financial year 2015-16, so the limitation period ran from 31.03.2016 to 31.03.2019. The proclamation of sale issued on 12.06.2018 was therefore within time. The ancillary objection based on the second certificate did not alter this conclusion.

Conclusion: The sale proclamation was not time-barred and the challenge under Rule 68B failed.

Final Conclusion: The writ petition was rejected because the recovery proceedings were held to be within the prescribed limitation period.

Ratio Decidendi: For the purpose of Rule 68B of the Second Schedule to the Income-tax Act, 1961, an assessment order attains finality only when it is no longer capable of being set aside, modified, or revised, and the limitation period for sale of attached immovable property runs from the end of the financial year in which that finality is reached.

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