ITAT Invalidates Reassessment Proceedings, Holds Vague Reasons Cannot Justify Reopening Under Section 147

The Delhi Bench of the Income Tax Appellate Tribunal (ITAT) has allowed the appeal of taxpayer Ishleen Kaur and quashed the reassessment proceedings initiated by the Income Tax Department for the Assessment Year 2014-15.

For the assessment year 2014-25, the assessee (Ishleen Kaur) had declared an aggregate income amounting to 3.11 lakh under the head of ‘Profits and Gains from Business and Profession’. The assessee’s case was reopened by the Assessing Officer (AO) based on the information received from the Investigation Wing, Rohtak. As per the information, a search operation on Tradenext Securities Limited (erstwhile Lifeline Securities Limited) along with one beneficiary of LTCG exempt under section 10 (38) of the Income Tax Act, 1961, Kundu Group of Rohtak. The search concluded that the said group was involved in providing accommodation entries of bogus LTCG through reputed stocks by forging the ante-dated contract notes.

Based on the aforesaid findings, the tax authorities came to a conclusion that certain income of the assessee had escaped assessment under Section 147 of the Act and made an addition of Rs. 96.97 lakh under Section 69A as unexplained money. An additional Rs. 1.93 lakh was also added under Section 69C towards the alleged commission paid for obtaining the accommodation entries.

The Commissioner of Income Tax (Appeals) [CIT(A)] upheld the additions, observing that Tradenext Securities Limited was allegedly involved in providing bogus LTCG entries and that similar issues had been decided in favour of the Revenue in various judicial precedents.

Being aggrieved with the lower authorities’ order, the assessee approached the ITAT, arguing that the reasons recorded for reopening the assessment were vague and did not specifically link her to any penny stock transaction. The Tribunal endorsed the assessee and noted that the AO had merely relied on the findings of the Investigation Wing without bringing any material on record directly connecting the assessee to the alleged bogus transactions.

The ITAT held that there was no tangible material available with the AO to form a valid belief that income had escaped assessment. Since the reassessment proceedings were initiated for vague and unsupported reasons, the Tribunal ruled that the AO lacked jurisdiction to reopen the case.

The court had relied on an earlier judgement of the High Court in a case based on a similar issue, which had held that “without recording proper reasons to believe the proceedings u/s 147 cannot be initiated. In the present case, there is no material available with the AO to initiate the proceedings u/s 147 of the Act and even the assessment was completed on the basis of abovesaid vague reasons. Therefore, the AO has no jurisdiction to initiate the proceedings u/s 148 of the Act in the present case.”

Accordingly, the assessee’s appeal was allowed.