TaxTMI 
TaxTMI 
2019 (8) TMI 1013
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....ssment years 2003-2004 to 2012-13 (10 Assessment years), which shall hereinafter be referred to as 'said AYs' for brevity. 6.Circumstances under which writ petitioners resorted to revision under Section 25 of said Act, briefly stated are that writ petitioners had wrongly included commercial establishments and residential house properties in their Wealth Tax returns qua said AYs though the said properties were let out for a minimum period of 300 days during the relevant previous AYs, that this error was committed as the writ petitioners were unaware of the exemption under Section 2(ea)(i)(4) of said Act. It is the case of the writ petitioners that they gained knowledge about this error only in the year 2015 and this aspect of the matter i.e., gaining knowledge is not disputed. 7. To be noted, writ petitioners have paid Wealth Tax on the aforesaid erroneous returns and therefore, this is clearly a case of over reporting of wealth. To put it differently, it is not a case of under reporting of wealth or non-filing of returns of wealth. 8.Having set out the circumstances under which writ petitioners resorted to revision under Section 25 of said Act briefly, it is to be noted ....
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....al of the provision under which impugned orders have been made, viz., Section 25(1)(c)(ii) of said Act makes it clear that the respondent does have powers to condone delay and most importantly, there is no cap qua time period with regard to condonation of delay. It is also not in disputation that the provisions of Section 25(1) of said Act is akin to Section 264 of IT Act. To be noted, Section 264 of IT Act deals with revisional powers of Principal Commissioner and Commissioner of Income Tax. 14. Be that as it may, a perusal of impugned orders, more particularly, impugned order II makes it clear that writ petitioners have only erroneously overstated the returns and it is not a case of under statement of wealth or non-filing of returns. This is articulated in Paragraph 4 of impugned order II, which reads as follows: '4.Decision-I have carefully considered the assessee's petition, the AR's oral and written submissions, the WTO's report and the Range Head's forwarding remarks. The assessee has quite clearly and mistakenly included as assets in her wealth tax returns the commercial establishments and the residential house property which had been let out for a min....
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....m the relevant Assessment Year cannot be condoned. No doubt the Board Circulars bind the respondent. Equally, there is no disputation before this Court that, it does not in any manner place fetters or come in the way of condoning the delay if this Court considers this as a fit case for condonation of delay. 17. In this backdrop, as already alluded to supra, even according to the impugned orders this is a case of over statement of wealth and it is not a case of understatement or non-filing of returns. More importantly, writ petitioners have also paid the tax on wealth that has been overstated in the returns. As already been alluded to supra that respondent has even recorded in the impugned orders that the properties which have been erroneously included in the returns by the writ petitioners are clearly exempt under Section 2(ea)(i)(4) of said Act. 18. It is not completely forbidden to have a cursory look and have a birds eye view qua merits of the matter while testing whether delay in a given case deserves to be condoned. As this cannot be the sole determinant, this Court has considered the same as one of the buttressing features in search of an answer to the question as to whethe....
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....n Pvt. Limited case reveals that a judgment rendered by another Hon'ble Division Bench of Gujarat High Court in Karamchand Premchand Pvt. Ltd. Vs. Commissioner of Income Tax, Gujarat [(1975) 101 ITR 46 (Guj)] was distinguished. While distinguishing Karamchand Premchand case, the Division Bench of Gujarat High Court had also reiterated that whether sufficient cause is made out or not is always a question of fact depending upon the facts and circumstances of each case and has to be established based on records of that case. This is articulated in paragraph 6 of the order and the most relevant portion of paragraph 6 reads as follows : "6.....However, it is equally well settled that a person invoking the decision of the appellate or revisional authority beyond the prescribed period of limitation is required to show sufficient cause which would include showing that the petitioner/appellant was either bona fide pursuing his remedies or was prevented by sufficient cause from pursuing his remedies. Whether sufficient cause is made out or not is always a question of fact depending upon the facts and circumstances of each case and has to be established on record. ...." 21 In this cas....
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.... follows : "9.Courts should not place reliance on decisions without discussing as to how the factual situation fits in with the fact situation of the decision on which reliance is placed. There is always peril in treating the words of a speech or judgment as though they are words in a legislative enactment, and it is to be remembered that judicial utterances are made in the setting of the facts of a particular case, said Lord Morris in Herrington v. British Railways Board [(1972) 2 WLR 537 : 1972 AC 877 (HL) [Sub nom British Railways Board v. Herrington, (1972) 1 All ER 749 (HL)]] . Circumstantial flexibility, one additional or different fact may make a world of difference between conclusions in two cases. " 24 Drawing inspiration from Vinay Extraction Pvt. Limited case and Padma Sundara Rao case, this Court is of the considered view that such an exercise of applying precedents is neither an algorithms nor an alchemy qua factual matrix and legal principles. 25 This takes us to the next case law, namely, H.Dohil Constructions Company Private Limited Vs. Nahar Exports Limited and another reported in (2015) 1 SCC 680. Nahar Exports Limited case is a case wherein there was nine....
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....writ petitioner should have stated and articulated the reasons for delay with specificity and clarity. Having said that, learned counsel for writ petitioner predicated his case on the ground that the entire chronicle of events alluded to supra bring into sharp focus trajectory of the consistent, relentless and recurrent efforts that were taken by writ petitioner with regard to getting Rs. 19.84 lakhs income excluded / exempted qua returns erroneously filed for said AY. 29 Therefore, while there is no disagreement with regard to Esha Bhattacharjee case principle, this is a case where the facts and chronicle of the same were undisputably available as part of records before third respondent who passed the impugned order. This is not a case where records did not speak for themselves with regard to relentless efforts taken by writ petitioner which in turn explained what is being construed as delay. 30 Besides the aforementioned five case laws set out supra, impugned order also refers to a Bombay High Court judgment being Manoj Kumar Kedia Vs. Pr. Commissioner of Income Tax [2016-LL-0811-29] in W.P.No.1616 of 2016. However, Revenue counsel fairly submitted that it is not traceable. L....