TaxTMI 
TaxTMI 
1986 (12) TMI 25
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....nager (Taxation). For the said year, a notice under section 210 of the Income-tax Act, 1961 (hereinafter to be referred as " the Act"), requiring to pay a sum of Rs. 1,43,47,719 as advance tax was served on the company on May 30, 1974. This notice was issued on the basis of the previous assessments. Under section 212 of the Act, it was open to the company, instead of making the payment of advance tax demanded under section 210, to submit an estimate of its current income if this current income was likely to be less than the income on which advance tax had been demanded under section 210. The company, in exercise of this right, filed an estimate in the prescribed form signed by Sh. Rama Shankar Bajpai on June 13, 1974, estimating its total i....
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....f advance tax in Form No. 29 as prescribed under the Income-tax Rules, 1962, which were false and which it either knew or believed to be false or did not believe to be true. The company had thus committed an offence punishable under section 277 of the Income-tax Act and section 177 of the Indian Penal Code. It was further averred that S/Sh. Sita Ram Singhania and Rama Shankar Bajpai had abetted the company in filing a false estimate of its total income and had thus committed offences punishable under section 278 of the Act and section 109 of the Indian Penal Code. Learned Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate, by his order dated November 15, 1985, took cognizance of the offences, found sufficient grounds to proceed against the company fo....
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....ing heard and was violative of the principles of natural justice. 5. The company was an artificial juridical person. It could not be attributed with any mens rea which was required to be proved for an offence under section 277 of the Act and, therefore, the complaint against the company was not competent. 6. The maximum sentence for the offences under section 277 at the relevant time was rigorous imprisonment for two years. This sentence could not be imposed on the company which was a juridical person and the complaint against the company was, therefore, liable to be quashed. Section 177 of the Criminal Procedure Code reads as under : " 177. Every offence shall ordinarily be inquired into and tried by a court within whose local juri....
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....dly took place at Kanpur and, therefore, the offences committed by them also were triable by a competent court at Kanpur. The Delhi Court, in these circumstances, had no jurisdiction to try the offences, the subject-matter of the complaint. Mr. D. K. Jain, learned counsel for the complainant, contended that section 277 of the Act has to be read along with sections 273 and 275 of the Act. It was pointed out that the assessments were completed at Delhi where it was found that estimates delivered by the company were false. The penalty proceedings were taken at Delhi and, therefore, the Delhi courts had jurisdiction to try the case. It was also contended that no prejudice was likely to be caused to the petitioners if the complaint was tried a....