TaxTMI 
TaxTMI 
2025 (5) TMI 2156
X X X X Extracts X X X X
X X X X Extracts X X X X
....1 [the Act] seeking to reopen the assessment in respect of the Assessment Year [AY] 2014-15. 2. It is the petitioner's case that the impugned notice has been issued beyond the period of the limitation. 3. In the present case, a search was conducted under Section 132 of the Act at the premises of an individual Sh. Ishwar Singh and his associates. During the said search, certain documents had been found and it was alleged that the same contained details of cash payments made by the petitioner to Ms. Meenakshi Bindish for purchase of immovable property amounting to Rs. 1,36,00,000/-. Based on the said material, the Assessing Officer [AO] issued the impugned notice on 31.08.2024. 4. The provisions of Section 153C of the Act are inapplicable ....
X X X X Extracts X X X X
X X X X Extracts X X X X
....tain bearing in mind the timeframes as they stood embodied in Section 149 (1) (b) or Section 153A and 153C, as the case may be. The First Proviso essentially requires us to undertake that consideration bearing in mind the timeframes which stood specified in Sections 149, 153A and 153C as they stood prior to the commencement of Finance Act, 2021. 9. Thus, an action of reassessment which comes to be initiated in relation to a search undertaken on or after 01 April 2021 would have to meet the foundational tests as specified in the First Proviso to Section 149(1). A reassessment action would thus have to not only satisfy the time frames constructed in terms of Section 149, but in a relevant case and which is concerned with a search, also thos....
X X X X Extracts X X X X
X X X X Extracts X X X X
....of in Section 153A (1), while defining the point from which the period of the "relevant assessment year" is to be calculated, to the date of receipt of the books of accounts, documents or assets seized by the jurisdictional AO of the non-searched person. The shift of the relevant date in the case of a non-searched person being regulated by the First Proviso of Section 153C (1) is an issue which is no longer res integra and stands authoritatively settled by virtue of the decisions of this Court in SSP Aviation and RRJ Securities as well as the decision of the Supreme Court in Jasjit Singh. The aforesaid legal position also stood reiterated by the Supreme Court in Vikram Sujitkumar Bhatia. The submission of the respondents, therefore, that th....
X X X X Extracts X X X X
X X X X Extracts X X X X
.... while speaking of the ten year block." 8. Bearing in mind the aforesaid principles, the block of ten assessment years is required to be reckoned from the end of the AY 2025-26 being the assessment year relevant to the financial year in which the impugned notice under Section 148 was issued. A tabular statement setting out the block of ten years as set out in the petition is reproduced below: AY 2025-26 Year 1 AY 2024-25 Year 2 AY 2023-24 Year 3 AY 2022-23 Year 4 AY 2021-22 Year 5 AY 2020-21 Year 6 AY 2019-20 Year 7 AY 2018-19 Year 8 AY 2017-18 Year 9 AY 2016-17 Year 10 AY 2015-16 Barred by limitation AY 2014-15 Barred by limitation 9. The issue involved in the present case is covered by the earlier decisions of th....