2026 (4) TMI 196

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....iled the Return of Income for Assessment Year 2023-24, and the said Return of Income was selected for complete scrutiny. The scrutiny assessment was undertaken by Respondent No. 2. Respondent No. 2 issued the final show cause notice dated 10th March 2025, seeking certain clarifications from the Petitioner. The Petitioner filed the response to the said notice on 11th March 2025. Personal hearing was also granted to the Petitioner on 13th March 2025. Although no assessment order was passed for the Assessment Year 2023-24, the Petitioner noticed that a demand of Rs. 16.27 Crores was reflected on the income-tax portal on 12th March 2025 for the said Assessment Year. Accordingly, the Petitioner raised grievances before various authorities, as it was the case of the Petitioner that neither any assessment order was received by the Petitioner nor any assessment order has been uploaded on the Income-tax portal for the said year. Thereafter, the Petitioner directly received a communication dated 3rd December 2025 from the Jurisdictional Assessing Officer (Respondent No. 1), stating that as per the record, the demand of Rs. 16.27 Crores is outstanding for the Assessment Year 2023-24 and the P....

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....omputation sheet and the notice of demand, also being signed after 31st March, 2025, are invalid and bad in law. Mr. Agrawal further submitted that the notice of demand is also invalid as the said notice of demand could not have been signed before passing the assessment order, and therefore, the notice of demand, having been signed on 12th December 2025, i.e. much before the assessment order, which is purportedly signed on 25th December 2025, is invalid and bad in law. 6. We have heard the parties and perused the documents filed in the present Petition. We have also gone through the assessment order, computation of income and the notice of demand for the Assessment Year 2023-24. It is not in dispute before us that the assessment order, though dated 21st March 2025, has been signed on 25th December 2025, and the notice of demand, though dated 21st March 2025, has been signed on 12th December 2025. Section 153(1) of the IT Act and the fourth proviso provides: "(1) No order of assessment shall be made under section 143 or section 144 at any time after the expiry of twenty-one months from the end of the assessment year in which the income was first assessable: ........

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....power within the period of limitation prescribed therefore. The order or decision of such authority comes into force or, becomes operative or becomes an effective order or decision on and from the date when it is signed by him. The date of such order or decision is the date on which the order or decision was passed or made: that is to say when he ceases to have any authority to tear it off and draft a different order and when he ceases to have any locus poenitentiae. Normally that happens when the order or decision is made public or notified in some form or when it can be said to have left his hand. The date of communication of the order to the party whose rights are affected is not the relevant date for purposes of determining whether the power has been exercised within the prescribed time." 10. Further, this Court in the case of Ambernath City Hospital (P) Ltd. v. UOI [(2026) 182 taxmann.com 268 (Bombay)), has, in the context of an unsigned notice issued under Section 148 of the IT Act, quashed the said unsigned notice by holding that the notice, which does not bear a digital or manual signature, is invalid and would not invest in the Assessing Officer any further jurisdiction....

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....he absence of a signature on the notice, the same would not constitute a mistake or omission and would not be curable under the provisions of section 292B of the IT Act. 21. We are, therefore, of the considered opinion that in the present case, the notice u/s.148 dated 02.04.2022 having no signature affixed on it, digitally or manually, the same is invalid and would not vest the Assessing Officer with any further jurisdiction to proceed to reassess the income of the petitioner. Consequently, the notice dated 02.04.2022 u/s. 148 of the Act issued to the petitioner being invalid and sought to be issued after three years from the end of the relevant assessment year 2015-16 with which we are concerned in this petition, any steps taken by the respondents in furtherance of notice dated 21.03.2022 issued under clause (b) of section 148A of the Act and order dated 02.04.2022 issued under clause (d) of section 148A of the Act, would be without jurisdiction, and therefore, arbitrary and contrary to Article 14 of the Constitution of India. Consequently, we quash and set aside the notice dated 02.04.2022 issued by the respondents u/s. 148 of the Act, order dated 02.04.2022 under claus....