TaxTMI 
TaxTMI 
1991 (9) TMI 54
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....ncome-tax Act, 1961, and under sections 193/196, IPC, pending in the court of the Chief judicial Magistrate, Sangrur, against the petitioners and further proceedings. The facts as gathered from the impugned complaint annexure P-5, may briefly be narrated : Jaswant Rai Mittal & Co. is a partnership firm, consisting of Ashok Kumar, Ramesh Kumar, Hans Raj Garg, Jaswant Rai, Smt. Kaushalya Devi, Smt. Salochana Devi. Smt. Pushpa Devi and Smt. Santi Devi. For the assessment year 1977-78, in the case of the firm, Jaswant Rai Mittal & Co., the accused, declared the income of the firm at Rs. 97,480 and, along with the return, they submitted copies of the trading account and profit and loss account, balance-sheet and capital account of the partners....
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....contract for the construction of MIG houses on behalf of the Punjab Housing Development Board, Chandigarh. A gross receipt of Rs. 9,78,946 was shown for the accounting period. However, on verification from the bank, it was found that the assessee had actually received a payment of Rs. 10,03,100 and thereby there was concealment of income of Rs. 24,154. The firm was called upon to explain and the firm claimed that a cheque for Rs. 19,370 issued by the said Board was not accounted for in the books of account since the same had been encashed in April, 1977. This plea was not accepted since the firm had been maintaining account books on mercantile basis. The firm could not give any explanation with respect to Rs. 4,784. With respect to this add....
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....o explain that discrepancy. Petitioner No. 1 explained that a cheque for Rs. 19,370 was issued by the Board on March 31, 1977, and since it was got encashed in April, 1977, the same was not accounted for during the financial year ending on March 31, 1977. The Income-tax Officer was not satisfied with the explanation and, accordingly, he assessed and added the sum of Rs. 24,154 to the income of the petitioner-firm. The Incometax Officer also imposed a penalty of Rs. 15,920. An appeal was preferred before the Commissioner of Income-tax (Appeals) who dismissed the same on July 23, 1984. The petitioner-firm then preferred a further appeal before the Income-tax Appellate Tribunal, Chandigarh Bench, Chandigarh. The Tribunal, while basing its find....
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....ing the income had been set aside and thus the conclusion that there was no concealment of income on the part of the petitioner to the tune of Rs. 24,154 cannot be accepted. The order of the Tribunal only set aside the penalty clause. The relevant observations of the Tribunal may be noted as under : ". . . We, however, on the strength of the said affidavit and admission of the assessee that he got the said cheque after March 31, 1977, and the photostat copy of payment of memorandum and two reconciliation statements, one coming to total payment of Rs. 9,61,794, shown by the assessee and the chief engineer, we are of the view that assessee should not have been visited with any penalty especially when the executive engineer himself was a gaze....
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....when extracted reads: "278B. (1) Where an offence under this Act has been committed by a company, every person who, at the time the offence was committed, was in charge of, and was responsible to, the company for the conduct of the business of the company as well as the company shall be deemed to be guilty of the offence and shall be liable to be proceeded against and punished accordingly : Provided that nothing contained in this sub-section shall render any such person liable to any punishment if he proves that the offence was committed without his knowledge or that he had exercised all due diligence to prevent the commission of such offence." In the impugned complaint, annexure P-5, the allegations made are only against Jaswant Rai, par....