Reassessment sanction and audit-default penalties require competent approval, proven business turnover, and consideration of reasonable cause.
Reassessment initiated more than three years after the relevant assessment year requires approval from the higher specified authority under section 151(ii). Approval from the authority under section 151(i) after the limited TOLA extension period is not a curable defect under section 292B; the resulting section 148A(d) order, section 148 notice and reassessment lack jurisdiction. Audit-default penalty requires proof that the assessee carried on a business and that legally relevant sales, turnover or gross receipts exceeded the prescribed threshold. Purchases and unverified transaction aggregates do not establish turnover. Consistent investment and capital-gains treatment may also constitute reasonable cause, preventing penalty under section 271B.
Issues: (i) Whether reassessment could validly be initiated when approval for the order under section 148A(d) and notice under section 148 was obtained from the authority under section 151(i), although approval under section 151(ii) was required; (ii) Whether penalty under section 271B was sustainable on the basis of an unreconciled aggregate of share and alleged derivative transactions, and despite the assessee's reasonable cause under section 273B.
Issue (i): Whether reassessment could validly be initiated when approval for the order under section 148A(d) and notice under section 148 was obtained from the authority under section 151(i), although approval under section 151(ii) was required.
Analysis: Approval under section 151 is a substantive jurisdictional safeguard for issuance of a notice under section 148. Under the substituted reassessment regime, where more than three years have elapsed from the end of the relevant assessment year, approval must be obtained from the higher specified authority under section 151(ii). TOLA extended the period during which the authority under section 151(i) could grant approval only until 30.06.2021; it did not continue that authority's competence in July 2022. Approval by the Principal Commissioner, instead of the authority specified in section 151(ii), was not curable under section 292B.
Conclusion: The approval was not granted by the competent specified authority. The order under section 148A(d), notice under section 148, reassessment order, and consequential addition were invalid and quashed, in favour of the assessee.
Issue (ii): Whether penalty under section 271B was sustainable on the basis of an unreconciled aggregate of share and alleged derivative transactions, and despite the assessee's reasonable cause under section 273B.
Analysis: Section 44AB applies only where the Revenue establishes that the assessee carried on a business and that its sales, turnover or gross receipts exceeded the prescribed threshold. The aggregate relied upon combined purchases, delivery-based share sales and an unverified alleged derivative figure; purchases alone could not constitute turnover. No primary material established intraday or derivative transactions, systematic share-trading activity, or the legally relevant turnover. The Revenue could not reverse the burden by requiring the assessee to prove absence of day trading. The consistent disclosure of shares as investments and income as capital gains, without assessment of the transactions as business income, also constituted reasonable cause under section 273B.
Conclusion: The prerequisites for section 44AB were not established and, independently, reasonable cause was proved. Penalty under section 271B was unsustainable and deleted, in favour of the assessee.
Final Conclusion: The reassessment lacked the mandatory jurisdictional sanction, and the alleged audit default was unsupported by proof of a taxable share-trading business or legally computed turnover.
Ratio Decidendi: Mandatory statutory preconditions must be strictly fulfilled: sanction from the authority specified under section 151 is indispensable for reassessment jurisdiction, and audit-default penalty requires proof of business activity and legally determinable turnover, subject to reasonable cause.