AI OCR 
TaxTMI 
TaxTMI 
TaxTMI 
2023 (7) TMI 1078
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....nt through email at [email protected], which belonged to Shri Debabrata Dan, a resident of Burdwan and looking after the income tax matters of the assessee. No information was given by Shri Debabrata Dan to the assessee. Subsequently, as the assessee was advised to approach an Income-tax practitioner at Kolkata as Shri Debabrata Dan was residing at Burdwan and was not in a position to carry out with the appellate work with this Tribunal. Due to the above mentioned circumstances, there was a delay of 282 days in filing of the appeal. 3. On the other hand, the ld. D/R opposed the request of the assessee for condonation of delay. 4. We have duly considered the rival submissions and gone through the record carefully. 5. Sub-section 5 of Section 253 contemplates that the Tribunal may admit an appeal or permit filing of memorandum of cross-objections after expiry of relevant period, if it is satisfied that there was a sufficient cause for not presenting it within that period. This expression "sufficient cause" employed in this Section has also been used identically in sub-Section 3 of Section 249 of the Act, which provides power to the ld. Commissioner to condone the delay in fili....
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....gal injury so suffered. Time is precious and the wasted time would never revisit. During efflux of time newer causes would sprout up necessitating newer persons to seek legal remedy by approaching the courts. So a life span must be fixed for each remedy. Unending period for launching the remedy may lead to unending uncertainty and consequential anarchy. Law of limitation is thus founded on public policy. It is enshrined in the maxim Interest reipublicae up sit finis litium (it is for the general welfare that a period be putt to litigation). Rules of limitation are not meant to destroy the right of the parties. They are meant to see that parties do not resort to dilatory tactics but seek their remedy promptly. The idea is that every legal remedy must be kept alive for a legislatively fixed period of time. A court knows that refusal to condone delay would result foreclosing a suitor from putting forth his cause. There is no presumption that delay in approaching the court is always deliberate. This Court has held that the words "sufficient cause" under Section 5 of the Limitation Act should receive a liberal construction so as to advance substantial justice vide Shakuntala Devi lain V....
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....s of appeal:- "1. That on the facts of the case and in law the order passed by the learned AO u/s 143(3) of the Act dated 29-12-2017 making additions of Rs.3,55,92,450/- u/s 68 of the Act in respect of Sundry Creditors and so sustained by the learned CIT(A) vide order dated 12-05-2022 is not as per law. 2. That, the Ld. AO erred in making the impugned addition u/s 68 of the Act of Rs.3,55,92,450/- on account of unexplained Sundry creditors when neither the purchases made by the assessee nor the corresponding Sales/Debtors were disputed by him and the learned CIT(A) erred in sustaining the said addition. 3. That the learned AO and the learned CIT(A) failed to appreciate the explanation given by the assessee that payment to Sundry Creditors of Rs.3,98,42,500/- was outstanding as at the yearend since the corresponding sale proceeds of Rs.4,20,76,538/- was not realized from Sundry Debtors during the year, thus resulting in short fall of working capital. 4. That the lower authorities failed to appreciate the fact that no addition is warranted u/s 68 of the Act w.r.t trade credits. 5. That, the appellant craves leave to amend, alter, modify, substitute, add to, abridge and/....
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....rounds. Nonetheless, despite lack of response to the five notices for furnishing of submissions, the appeal is also examined on the basis of material available on record and merits. The matter has been considered. The assessment order and the statement of facts given by the appellant in Form 35 have been carefully examined. The three grounds of appeal being interlinked are taken up together for adjudication. 6.1 The appellant in the Statement of facts while accepting the following "It is true that confirmatory letters in respect of all Sundry Creditors were not furnished during assessment" has also failed to furnish any information, submissions or documents in respect of his grounds of appeal. The appellant's contention that by accepting purchase and sales the amount of sundry creditors of Rs. 3,55,92,450/- cannot be treated as explained is also not acceptable as it is seen from para 3 of the Assessment Order that despite being issued summons to appear and to present the books of accounts along with evidence in respect of sundry creditors, the same was not complied with by the assessee and no evidence/ book of accounts was furnished. Para 4.1 of the Assessment Order reproduc....
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....espite being aware of requests for submissions on the grounds of appeal in these appellate proceedings, it is seen that no details were filed by the appellant during the present appeal proceedings despite five opportunities being given to him vide notices issued over a span of sixteen months. Therefore, in the absence of any details being furnished by the appellant, the appellant's statement that these are sundry creditors cannot be accepted as no evidence what so ever has been furnished by the appellant to establish the claim. In the light of all of the above, there is no reason available on record for any change in the order of the AO and therefore the grounds of appeal 1, 2 and 3 are dismissed." 12. Aggrieved, the assessee is now in appeal before this Tribunal. 13. The ld. Counsel for the assessee referring to the written submissions as well as paper book filed on 02/05/2023 containing 26 pages, submitted that the ld. CIT(A) ought to have considered the fact that the sales and purchases of the assessee have almost doubled during the year. Out of the total sales of Rs. 12,35,14,252/-, major sales were made to S.G. Traders and the outstanding amount receivable from S.G. Tra....
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....er:- Particulars F.Y. 2014-15 F.Y. 2013-14 Purchases 12,23,35,350 5,54,39,853 Sundry Creditors 3,98,42,500 14,13,894 Sales 12,35,14,252 5,71,78,470 Sundry Debtors 4,20,76,538 12,99,140 15.2. Further, we notice that the sundry debtors of Rs. 4,20,76,538/- comprised of following three parties:- 1. Nigrika Exports Limited - Rs.5,90,940/- 2. Saraf Impax Pvt. Ltd. - Rs.7,08,200/- 3. S.G. Traders - Rs.4,07,77,398/- Total - Rs.4,20,76,538/- 16. We also notice that sundry creditors at the close of the year consisted of around 115 persons. The details of which are available at page 7-9 of the paper book and as stated by the ld. Counsel for the assessee, these are mostly farmers who sold their agricultural produce of rice to the assessee and the details contain names, addresses and amount outstanding to be paid. We note that the ld. Assessing Officer has not doubted the book results, accepted the sales as well as the quantity appearing in the trading and loss account. So the genuineness of the sale transactions has not been doubted nor the percentage of profit earned during the year has been doubted and the addition has been made u/s 68 of the....
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....t the sundry creditors to which necessary reply was filed stating that the nature of the said credit was purchases and source of the credit was purchases from the farmers, whose names and addresses were filed. The next part of the section is that the explanation offered by the assessee is found to be satisfactory by the Assessing Officer. Once the assessee has discharged its primary onus by giving the details of nature and source of the credit, it is upon the Assessing Officer to first rebut those details and then should ask the assessee to furnish any other details with the help of which the ld. Assessing Officer can be satisfied. In the given case, ld. Assessing Officer was satisfied with the confirmation received in the case of few of the sundry creditors but for the remaining, confirmation letters could not be received. There is no straight jacket formula provided under the Act through which one can be satisfied that Section 68 of the Act is not applicable and thus it varies from case to case as well as the facts and the satisfaction level of the Officer. 18. In the instant case, the ld. AO has failed to take note of the fact that books of accounts were audited and the same ha....
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....ubsequently, during any previous year, if the creditor remits or waives any such liability, then the assessee is liable to pay tax under section 41. The objective behind this section is simple. It is made to ensure that the assessee does not get away with a double benefit once by way of deduction and another by not being taxed on the benefit received by him in the later year with reference to deduction allowed earlier in case of remission of such liability. It is undisputed fact that the assessee had been paying interest at 6 per cent per annum to the KJC as per the contract but the assessee never claimed deduction for payment of interest under section 36(1)(iii). In the case at hand, the Commissioner(Appeals) relied upon section 41(1) and held that the assessee had received amortization benefit. Amortization is an accounting term that refers to the process of allocating the cost of an asset over a period of time, hence, it is nothing else than depreciation. Depreciation is a reduction in the value of an asset over time, in particular, to wear and tear. Therefore, the deduction claimed by the assessee in previous assessment years was due to the deprecation of the machine and not on....