TaxTMI 
TaxTMI 
1992 (8) TMI 108
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....ts income at Rs. 14,50,000 and paid advance tax of Rs. 8,06,542 thereon. This estimate was considered to be falling within the mischief of section 273(2)(aa) of the Act as the total income assessed under section 143(3) on 28-3-1988 amounted to Rs. 25,26,490 which, on appeal, was reduced to Rs. 24,44,700 as could be seen from the revised order passed under section 251 on 21-9-1988. Before completing the assessment. the ITO had initiated penalty proceedings under section 273(2)(aa) of the Act and called upon the assessee to show cause against the levy of penalty. As there was no response to the said show-cause notice, which was fixed for hearing on 27-9-1989, the ITO presumed that the assessee had no explanation to offer. He, therefore, concl....
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....tion disallowed, the total income assessed worked out to Rs. 24,14,173. The Commissioner was of the view that unless there was a finding that the claim for depreciation on cylinders had been made deliberately to lower the income for purposes of advance tax, it could not be said that the estimate filed was low within the meaning of section 273(2)(aa) under section 209A(4) of the Act, as the amount of depreciation could not be included for calculating the liability. The Commissioner held that in the absence of any such findings, the levy of penalty under section 273(2)(aa) of the Act was not justified and, accordingly. cancelled the same. This is being objected to by the Revenue in the present appeal before the Tribunal. 5. Shri Chatterjee ....
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....ll there and, therefore, the assessee had to explain the same that the imposition of penalty was justified as the returned income was Rs. 17,88,520, whereas the income estimated for purposes of advance tax was Rs. 14,50,000. 8. I have carefully considered the contentions of parties in the light of the materials placed before me. In my view, the decision of the CIT (Appeals) cancelling the penalty imposed under section 273(2)(aa) of the Act is correct and has to be upheld for the following reasons. 9. Under section 273(2)(aa), a penalty is leviable if an assessee has furnished under section 209A(4) or under section 212(3A) an estimate of advance tax payable by him which he knew or had reason to believe to be untrue. In the present case, th....
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....a contentious issue and the assessee could not have anticipated the disallowance of its claim by the ITO at the assessment stage. The very fact that the assessee's claim has been accepted by the Tribunal shows that it is a bona fide claim put forward by the assessee. Therefore, there could be no question of treating the estimate filed by the assessee under section 209A(4) of the Act on 15-12-1984 as one which the assessee knew or had reason to believe to be untrue. The burden of proving this as per the case law is entirely on the Revenue and not on the assessee. This is now well settled by the decision of the Calcutta High Court in the case of Birla Cotton Spg. & Wvg. Mills Ltd. In this decision, their Lordships have held as follows, as cou....