Allowing assesses less than 24 hours to respond to show cause notice when there is no fear of the assessment getting time barred in the near future is a flaw in the decision making process.
The High Court held as under:
1) Non-exercise of writ jurisdiction in case of availability of an alternative remedy is a self imposed restriction based upon convenience and discretion rather then a rule of law;
2) In appropriate cases where there is a serious flaw in the decision making process or prejudice is caused to a party on account of breach of natural justice, HC is enjoined upon to exercise its writ jurisdiction;
3) Once the Assessing Officer has called upon the petitioner to show cause why its claim for deduction under Section 80IA of the Act couldn’t be disallowed, then a reasonable opportunity of filing its reply to be made available to the noticee of the show cause notice, i.e., petitioner;
4) In this case, less than 24 hours period was granted to the petitioner to respond to the notice, particularly when there was no fear of the assessment getting time barred in the near future;
5) In such circumstances, it was incumbent upon the notice issuing authority to grant reasonable opportunity to the petitioner to respond to the notice. In fact, granting of an opportunity to respond to the show cause notice in less than 24 hours is a flaw in the decision making process and therefore amenable to judicial review;
6) The non consideration of the petitioner’s response to the notice by making it impossible to the petitioner to file its reply for the consideration of the Assessing Officer does cause prejudice to the petitioner leading to palpable injustice. Thus, the impugned assessment order was quashed and set aside - Vodafone India Ltd. v. Union of India [2013] 40 taxmann.com 545 (Bombay)
The High Court held as under:
1) Non-exercise of writ jurisdiction in case of availability of an alternative remedy is a self imposed restriction based upon convenience and discretion rather then a rule of law;
2) In appropriate cases where there is a serious flaw in the decision making process or prejudice is caused to a party on account of breach of natural justice, HC is enjoined upon to exercise its writ jurisdiction;
3) Once the Assessing Officer has called upon the petitioner to show cause why its claim for deduction under Section 80IA of the Act couldn’t be disallowed, then a reasonable opportunity of filing its reply to be made available to the noticee of the show cause notice, i.e., petitioner;
4) In this case, less than 24 hours period was granted to the petitioner to respond to the notice, particularly when there was no fear of the assessment getting time barred in the near future;
5) In such circumstances, it was incumbent upon the notice issuing authority to grant reasonable opportunity to the petitioner to respond to the notice. In fact, granting of an opportunity to respond to the show cause notice in less than 24 hours is a flaw in the decision making process and therefore amenable to judicial review;
6) The non consideration of the petitioner’s response to the notice by making it impossible to the petitioner to file its reply for the consideration of the Assessing Officer does cause prejudice to the petitioner leading to palpable injustice. Thus, the impugned assessment order was quashed and set aside - Vodafone India Ltd. v. Union of India [2013] 40 taxmann.com 545 (Bombay)
No comments:
Post a Comment