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TaxTMI 
TaxTMI 
TaxTMI 
2006 (4) TMI 113
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....the assessee/respondent for the assessment years 1979-80, 1980-81, 1981-82 and 1982-83. In pursuance of the said notices, the assessee filed returns of income on March 25, 1986 and thereafter filed revised returns on December 8, 1986, and claimed that the returns have been filed under the amnesty scheme. The proceedings of assessment were taken up on March 10, 1987 and additions of Rs. 2,500, Rs. 3,500, Rs. 4,500 and Rs. 4,500 were made for the assessment years 1979-80, 1980-81, 1981-82 and 1982-83 and it was stated in the assessment orders that the assessee had agreed to the additions. The assessment orders, however, were not served on the assessee. The assessee then received the show cause notices on July 4, 1988, under section 221 ....
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....and that since the returns were filed under the amnesty scheme, the Assessing Officer was not entitled to make any addition. The aforesaid contention of the assessee was not accepted by the Deputy Commissioner of Income-tax (Appeals) and the appeals of the assessee were dismissed. 5. The assessee then filed the second appeal before the Tribunal and the Tribunal in its order dated October 8, 1993, in I. T. A. Nos. 507 to 510/IND/1992, held that the assessments were barred by limitation. The Commissioner of Income-tax, Madhya Pradesh, then filed reference applications Nos. 332 to 335/Ind/1993 before the Tribunal and the Tribunal has referred the following question of law to this court for opinion : "Whether, on the facts and in the circumst....
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....t in State of Andhra Pradesh v. M. Ramakishtaiah and Co. [1994] 93 STC 406, wherein it has been held that in the absence of any explanation whatsoever by the Department for the inordinate delay in service of order of assessment on the assessee, the court must presume that the order was not made on the date it purported to have been made and must have been made after the expiry of the period of four years prescribed for passing such an order in revision. 8. Paragraph 5 of the appellate order dated October 8, 1993, of the Tribunal, in which the Tribunal has given the reasons for coming to the conclusion that the assessments were barred by limitation, is quoted hereunder : "Paragraph 5. The Income-tax Act, though no where mentions that the o....
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....nt orders also did not bear the correct date. In this view of the matter, it is held that the assessments are barred by limitation. The onus to prove that the assessment has been completed within the period of limitation is on the Department. The circumstances obtaining in this case, do show that the Department has failed to substantiate that the assessments were completed within the period of limitation. In this connection, reference may be made to the observations of the jurisdictional High Court in the case of CIT v. Swarn Taneja [1990] 186 ITR 348 (MP) at pages 352 and 353. The assessments are, therefore, quashed." 9. It will be clear from the findings in paragraph 5 of the appellate order quoted above that the Tribunal came to the con....
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....any case, the aforesaid decision of the Tribunal that the assessments were barred by limitation, is a decision purely on facts. It is a settled position of law that in a reference under section 256 of the Act, the High Court cannot disturb the findings of fact arrived at by the Tribunal. In Patnaik and Co. Ltd. v. CIT [1986] 161 ITR 365, the Supreme Court held (page 367) : "It is now well-settled that the Appellate Tribunal is the final fact-finding authority under the Income-tax Act and that the court has no jurisdiction to go behind the statements of fact made by the Tribunal in its appellate order. The court may do so only if there is no evidence to support them or the Appellate Tribunal has misdirected itself in law in arriving at the ....