S.124: Jurisdiction of Assessing Officer –Assessee participated in proceedings and filed return voluntarily at
Delhi, assessment order passed at Agra was held to be valid.
The petitioner, a share broker, was incorporated in U.P. After shifting its corporate office to Delhi, the petitioner, as per CLB order of 24-1-2003, also shifted its registered office. It was alleged that up to AY 2000-01, filing of income tax returns and assessment thereof were made at Agra. For the year 2002-03, the return was filed at Delhi. Through the instant writ petition, the petitioner prayed for quashing of the assessment order dated 28-3-2005 passed at Agra for AY 2002-03 and for issuing of directions to the respondents to restrain to proceed with penalty proceedings. The petitioner submitted that the writ was maintainable in as much as entire proceedings of assessment by the AO at Agra were without jurisdiction. On the facts, the petitioner could not have changed the place of his assessment and proceeded to file the return unilaterally at Delhi. He participated in the assessment proceedings and acquiesced to the jurisdiction of the Assessing Authority, Agra but it was only when the assessment order was made on protective basis against the company and on substantive basis against its director, who was found to have indulged in large scale fictitious and bogus transactions, that the petitioner filed writ petitions. The Court held that, section 124 provides for jurisdiction of AO. Sub-section (1) and (5) of section 124, when read together provide that where two or more AOs have territorial jurisdiction in respect of same income, they exercise concurrent jurisdiction in the matter of issuing notice to the assessee and where notices have been issued by any one office, it is unnecessary for the other office to issue the same notice again. In respect of petitioner, a survey was conducted under section 133A on 24-4-2001 in which a large number of incriminating documents were found. After enquiries, the AO found that there were serious defects in the books of
account. The director had created large number of fictitious concerns, which were not doing any business and therefore, the AO completed the assessment on protective basis. The director appeared and filed reply to the notice and clearly stated before the AO that his company was assessed to tax with Company Circle-1 (2) at Agra. The petitioner thus acquiesced to the jurisdiction, which the AO at Agra already possessed, and allowed him to complete the assessment proceedings for the assessment year 2001-02.In the circumstances, there was no error in exercise of jurisdiction by the ACIT, Circle-IV(1) Agra. The writ petition was accordingly, dismissed. (A.Y. 2002-03)
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