TaxTMI 
TaxTMI 
2008 (11) TMI 153
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....264 of the Income-tax Act, the assessee is entitled to prefer a revision within a period of one year from the date of the assessment order. However, without availing of the remedy of filing revision petition, the appellant-assessee approached this court by filing W. P. Nos. 21111 to 21113 of 1994. By order dated December 22, 2000, this court, while dismissing W. P. No. 21111 of 1994 as infructuous, disposed the remaining two writ petitions with the following directions : " However, the petitioner is given liberty to approach the Commissioner of Income-tax for waiver of interest under section 264 of the Act. The petitioner is also permitted to prefer revision petition within a period of one month from this date. I am of the view that since the writ petition was entertained by this court and the matter has been pending from the date of filing of the writ petition, the Commissioner of Income-tax is directed to take the revision petition that may be filed under section 264 of the Act by the petitioner, if the application is filed within one month from the date without raising any objection as to limitation and the Commissioner is directed to consider the said petition on the merits ....
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....is court within the prescribed period. 6. This takes us to the only question as to whether the appellant-assessee is justified in not preferring the revision petitions as directed by this court within a period of one month. Immediately after the revision petitions were filed on May 7, 2001, a doubt was entertained as to whether the revision petitions could be entertained for consideration on the merits, as they were filed beyond a period of one month as directed by this court. In fact, in the revision petitions as to the earliest opportunity available to the appellant-assessee, it is stated as follows in paragraph 2. " 2. The final portion of the above order was pronounced in the open court on December 22, 2000, and on the very same date our counsel, M/s. George Cheriyan and B. Ravi Raja have applied for the order copy. We understand from our counsel that the said application has been lost by the Court Registry and our counsel have to reapply for the same. The reapplication was made by our counsel on February 27, 2001, and the order was made available and delivered to our counsel on April 16, 2001. We were informed by our counsel that only the final portion of the order was p....
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....splaced and, therefore, we as the counsel were called upon to make a fresh application. Accordingly, a fresh copy application was made on February 27, 2001, in C. D. No. 3205 of 2001 and the same was processed and the order copy made ready on April 16, 2001, and delivered on the same day. I state that within 30 days of obtaining the order copy of this hon'ble court, the petitioner has filed on May 7, 2001, petition under section 264 of the Income-tax Act as directed by this hon'ble court. 3. I state that the respondent required a clarification to be obtained from the hon'ble High Court regarding the prescribed limitation stated in the order for filing petition under section 264 of the Income-tax Act. I further state that accordingly W. M. P. Nos. 15409 and 15410 of 2002 in W. P. Nos. 21111 to 21113 of 1994 were filed seeking for clarification from this hon'ble court as required by the respondent. In spite of the best efforts by us and in spite of having the W. M. Ps. numbered seeking clarification of this hon'ble court, the matter was not listed as we were informed by the Registry that the main writ bundle could not be located. In the meantime the respondent has dismissed the pe....
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....ately copy application was made and since the same was misplaced in the Registry, another copy application was made on February 27, 2001, and thereafter the copy was obtained on April 16, 2001, and the revision petitions were filed within a period of one month prescribed by the court. There is no delay on the part of the appellant-assessee in preferring the revision petitions within a period of 30 days from the date when the copy was obtained. Of course, the learned counsel who represented the appellant should have intimated the orders of this court to prefer the revision petitions at least when he came to know that the application was misplaced in the Registry and another application was filed and, in the meantime, his failure to ascertain the actual order passed by this court. Nevertheless, the question is whether a litigant should be prejudiced due to the fault of the advocate. In our opinion, when the fault of the advocate is justified by giving sufficient reasons by way of filing an affidavit, the court should normally entertain and accept such explanation and pass orders. Yet another aspect which weighs our mind as to the bona fide of the appellant/assessee is that the assess....