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Resolution professional claim admission does not acknowledge debt or extend limitation for personal-guarantor insolvency proceedings.
Section 95 insolvency applications against personal guarantors are subject to the three-year limitation period under Article 137, running from expiry of the period stated in the demand invoking the guarantee. Any applicable COVID-19 exclusion must be deducted, but an application instituted after the resulting period expires is time-barred and not maintainable. Extension under Section 18 requires a conscious, unequivocal acknowledgment of subsisting liability by the debtor or an authorised person before limitation expires. A resolution professional's admission of a creditor's claim is an administrative act of collating and recording claims, not an admission of liability by the corporate debtor; it therefore neither acknowledges debt nor renews limitation.
Parallel investigation requests cannot bypass an existing judicial stay on an FIR already under judicial consideration.
Where allegations in complaints to the CBI and Enforcement Directorate substantially overlap with an FIR whose investigation has been stayed and remains pending before a High Court, directions for a parallel investigation or takeover cannot be pursued before another forum. Relief from the stay, or expedition of the pending proceedings, must be sought before the court already seized of the FIR or before the Supreme Court. The requested investigative directions were therefore unavailable.
Pleading amendments based on a compromise preserve limitation where they arise from the original transaction, unlike belated damages claims.
Order VI Rule 17 of the Code of Civil Procedure permits amendment of a timely recovery claim to reflect a compromise arising from the same underlying transaction, because the amendment does not introduce a fresh cause of action. The unpaid compromise amount therefore remained recoverable, while damages first sought through amendment were barred by limitation. Failure to withdraw the suit under the compromise did not defeat recovery where the opposing party had failed to honour its own payment obligation. Liability for the compromised debt attached to the parties to the compromise; a former director who was not a party to that compromise was not liable.
Related-party exclusion bars creditors from CoC rights where contractual control permits policy-making participation despite a non-bona-fide assignment.
Corporate-guarantee liability falls within financial debt even if the guarantee was uninvoked when CIRP began; default is relevant to CIRP commencement rather than the existence of a claim. An individual homebuyer may challenge a creditor's CoC inclusion without acting through the class's authorised representative, whose statutory role is limited to attending meetings and voting. Contractual rights enabling policy-making participation and extensive business supervision may render a financial creditor a related party, excluding it from CoC representation, participation and voting. A post-CIRP assignment that is not bona fide cannot bypass the related-party exclusion.
Telecommunications switch parts classification treats integrated chassis-backplane assemblies as apparatus parts eligible for basic customs-duty relief.
Model-specific RSA chassis and backplane assemblies with integrated backplane PCBAs, imported without interface cards, power modules or processor/control cards, are classified as parts of heading 8517 under tariff item 8517 79 90. They lack the essential character and independent signal-processing function of complete photonic service switches and are solely or principally suitable for those switches; the integrated assembly is not merely a populated printed circuit board. Goods under that tariff item qualify for nil basic customs duty under Serial No. 5(a) of Notification No. 57/2017-Customs, unless they are parts of cellular mobile phones or wrist wearable devices. The relief applies only to basic customs duty, not integrated tax or other duties, taxes or cesses.
FOB value re-determination under binding remand directions cannot reopen settled misdeclaration findings and requires compliance with valuation procedure.
FOB value re-determination following an unchallenged remand order is limited to applying the prescribed valuation procedure; findings that declared values were doubtful, misdeclaration was established, and re-determination was required cannot be reopened. Application of Rules 5 to 8 of the Valuation Rules, 1988 requires examination of the values of the relevant goods. Re-determined FOB values consistent with binding remand directions require no interference.
Statutory appellate remedy restored when procedural barriers denied customs appellants any merits hearing before an appellate forum.
Restoration of the statutory customs appeal was warranted because prior withdrawal, dismissal of the writ petition, and refusal to recall the appeal had deprived the appellants of any appellate consideration on merits. The right of appeal operates as a valuable remedy requiring at least one appellate forum to address an aggrieved party's grievance. The appellants may pursue their appeal before CESTAT, which must decide it on merits within the stipulated period.
Unchallenged settlement deeds confer absolute title, enabling valid testamentary disposition and defeating partition claims based on unproven benami allegations.
Unchallenged settlement deed confers absolute title on the testatrix where no relief is sought to set it aside, preventing a partition claim founded on an alleged benami purchase. A testamentary disposition made by the absolute owner governs succession to that property. Due execution and attestation of a registered Will require compliance with the statutory requirements for execution and proof through attesting-witness evidence. Alleged suspicious circumstances, including age, health, place of registration, or the executor's role, do not invalidate the Will unless supported by acceptable evidence. Registration at the testatrix's residence alone does not create suspicion.
Rule 27 limits reassessment challenges, while disclosed business receipts cannot be treated as unexplained cash deposits.
Rule 27 permits a respondent to support the appealed order on a ground decided against it, but does not enlarge the appeal or allow a fresh jurisdictional challenge seeking annulment of reassessment where that challenge was not raised before the first appellate authority. Cash deposits are not unexplained money where bank statements, audit reports and financial statements already on record show disclosed business turnover exceeding the deposits, with related payments supporting their business-receipt character. Absence of an Assessing Officer's remand report on examination of books does not justify an addition when the deposits are otherwise satisfactorily explained.
Fresh verification of salary expenditure requires record examination and adequate opportunity, resulting in restoration for fresh assessment.
Salary expenditure disallowed under Section 40A(3) required fresh verification because ledger extracts, cash book entries and other supporting material needed examination by the Assessing Officer. Adequate opportunity was required to substantiate the genuineness of the expenditure. The matter was restored to the Assessing Officer for fresh examination of the supporting material and the salary-expenditure disallowance.
Undisclosed income requires search-based proof of falsity; recorded technical-service expenses cannot attract search penalty merely on surrender.
Penalty under section 271AAB applies only where surrendered income meets the statutory definition of undisclosed income. A search disclosure alone does not establish that status. Where technical-services expenditure is recorded in regular books and supported by bank payments, bills and tax deduction, its mere non-verifiability does not establish a false entry. Classification as undisclosed income requires material showing falsity that emerged during the search, such as incriminating evidence, forged documents, a non-existent supplier or lack of actual services. On those facts, the surrendered amount falls outside the undisclosed-income definition and no penalty is sustainable.
Rectification for apparent error cannot reopen limitation findings through reappreciation of disputed evidence or alternative views.
Rectification under section 254(2) is limited to an obvious, patent mistake apparent from the record, identifiable without prolonged reasoning or a fresh factual examination. Reconsideration of limitation findings based on dispatch and postal records, service at an incorrect address, notice-server material, approval records, later-cited authorities, or fresh contentions requires reappreciation of disputed evidence. Such reconsideration is an impermissible review, not rectification. A debatable issue or an alternative view cannot support amendment of an earlier Tribunal order under section 254(2).
Cash payment disallowance was deleted where genuine supplier payments were explained by an unorganised cash-based liquor trade environment.
Cash payments exceeding the applicable daily threshold may not warrant disallowance where they are genuine business payments and are satisfactorily explained. Section 40A(3) targets the circulation of unaccounted money rather than legitimate commercial transactions. In an unorganised, cash-based liquor trade, the factual business environment supported the explanation for cash payments to the supplier. The payments were treated as genuine and explained, resulting in deletion of the disallowance.
Concealment Penalty Fails When Quashed Reassessment Removes the Underlying Basis for Its Imposition and Validity
Penalty for concealment of income initiated during reassessment proceedings loses its foundation where those reassessment proceedings have already been quashed. The validity of penalty under Section 271(1)(c) depends on the continuing existence of the reassessment in which it was initiated. Once that underlying reassessment is set aside, the consequential concealment penalty cannot survive and is liable to be deleted in favour of the assessee.
Business-loss set-off verification requires reconciliation of deemed income and tax computations to prevent double deduction of carried-forward losses.
Business-loss set-off and consequent tax computation in return processing require verification where adjusted income does not reconcile with tax determined. Entry and adoption of deemed income under section 115JC is not, by itself, erroneous, but its interaction with loss set-off, applicable judicial precedents, and later-year records must be reconsidered. Fresh determination after hearing is required to correct computational discrepancies and prevent double deduction of carried-forward losses.
Reasonable limitation period restricts delayed tax-collection-default orders despite absence of an express statutory deadline and protects tax finality.
Limitation restricts orders treating a taxpayer as in default for failure to collect tax at source under Section 206C(6A), even where no express statutory period applied at the relevant time. The power must be exercised within a reasonable four-year period from the end of the relevant financial year; delayed proceedings are time-barred, and consequential interest under Section 206C(7) does not survive. A limitation objection may be admitted as an additional ground where it is a pure legal issue, all material facts are already on record, and no further factual inquiry is required. The subsequently inserted Section 206C(7A) does not govern earlier orders.
Arm's-length related-party interest requires consistent tax treatment where an identical rate was accepted in the succeeding assessment year.
Related-party interest paid at a rate accepted as arm's length in an identical transaction for the immediately succeeding assessment year requires consistent treatment under Section 40A(2) of the Income-tax Act. Applying the prior coordinate-bench position, the interest disallowance was deleted. Acceptance of the rate in materially identical circumstances supported allowance of the related-party interest expenditure.
Final Vivad Se Vishwas settlements bar revisionary reassessment of concluded tax arrears and restore original assessments.
Final settlement under the Vivad Se Vishwas Scheme conclusively closes the assessment dispute concerning the relevant tax arrears. Once the competent authority issues a full and final settlement order, the underlying assessment cannot be reopened through revisionary jurisdiction under Section 263. Revisionary proceedings initiated after such settlement are therefore impermissible, and the original assessment remains restored.
Bank-account credits from cooperative loan cycles cannot justify presumptive profit estimation without evidence of separate business receipts.
Bank-account credits arising from agricultural-loan disbursements and recoveries cannot, without further factual material, support a presumptive-profit addition at 8%. Correspondence between substantial withdrawals and deposits, together with the entity's registered cooperative lending activities, supports the explanation that the entries represent loan flows rather than business receipts. In the absence of evidence of another business activity or a factual basis for the profit estimate, the addition was unsustainable and deleted.
Post-search reassessment requires statutory notice and prior approval; direct scrutiny assessments for covered earlier years lack jurisdiction.
Post-search assessments for preceding assessment years covered by Explanation 2 to section 148 must follow the special reassessment mechanism under sections 147 and 148. The deeming fiction of escapement of income displaces direct scrutiny assessment under section 143(3); neither administrative selection nor taxpayer participation can cure the absence of a jurisdictional reassessment notice. Prior approval under section 148B is mandatory before assessment, reassessment, or recomputation and requires independent consideration of relevant seized material. General supervisory or administrative approval cannot substitute for this statutory safeguard. Non-compliance with either requirement renders the assessment void for lack of jurisdiction.