RAMESH DUTT PANDEY,BUXER V. AO NFAC, DELHI, DELHI

ITA 31/PAT/2025

AI Insights

The case involves Ramesh Dutt Pandey, an individual and professional Pandit, who, along with his brother, sold their ancestral property. The sale was initially recorded at a lower value, but later, discrepancies were noted leading to a higher valuation reported to the District Sub-Registration Office. The Income Tax Officer (ITO) issued notices under sections 148A(b) and 148 of the Income Tax Act, which the assessee failed to respond to due to communication issues with his consultant. Consequently, the ITO added the entire consideration amount as long-term capital gain to the assessee's income. The CIT(Appeals) dismissed the appeal ex-parte due to the assessee's non-cooperation. Aggrieved by this, the assessee approached the ITAT, which decided to remand the case back to the CIT(Appeals) for a fresh hearing.

• Counselvise Citation: [2025] 140 COUNSELVISE.COM (IT) 396592 (ITAT-PATNA)
• Appeal Type: Income Tax Appeal
• Pronouncement Date: 26-05-2025
• Appeal Filed By: Assessee
• Order Result: Allowed
• Bench Allotted: DB
• Assessment Year: 2019-2020
• Laws Referred To: Income Tax Act
• Result in Favour of: Assessee
• Court: TRIBUNAL
• Keywords: Set aside; Opportunity of being heard; Principle of natural justice
• Section: 148; 54

Judgement Text

" ITA No. 31/PAT/2025 (A.Y. 2019-2020) Ramesh Dutt Pandey 1 IN THE INCOME TAX APPELLATE TRIBUNAL, KOLKATA-PATNA ‘e-COURT’, KOLKATA [Hybrid Court Hearing] Before Shri Duvvuru RL Reddy, Vice-President (KZ) & Shri Sanjay Awasthi, Accountant Member I.T.A. No. 31/PAT/2025 Assessment Year: 2019-2020 Ramesh Dutt Pandey,……………..……..………Appellant Bandha Patwa Road, Dunraon, Buxer-802119, Bihar [PAN:COUPP1405A] -Vs.- Income Tax Officer,………………….…………...Respondent NFAC, Delhi Appearances by: Shri Rakesh Kumar, Advocate, appeared on behalf of the assessee Shri Ashwani Kumar Singal, JCIT, appeared on behalf of the Revenue Date of concluding the hearing: May 01, 2025 Date of pronouncing the order: May 26, 2025 O R D E R Per Duvvuru RL Reddy, Vice-President (KZ):- The present appeal is directed at the instance of assessee against the order of ld. Commissioner of Income Tax (Appeals), National Faceless Appeal Centre (NFAC), Delhi dated 10th January, 2025 passed for Assessment Year 2019-20. ITA No. 31/PAT/2025 (A.Y. 2019-2020) Ramesh Dutt Pandey 2 2. Brief facts of the case are that the assessee is an individual. and a Professional Pandit performing Puja and other religious rituals. The assessee and his brother sold their ancestral property by one sale deed for a total consideration of Rs.162,50,000/- and the share of the assessee was 25% of the total sale consideration I .e. Rs.40,62,500/-. But the actual amount of sale property was Rs.1,44,00,000/- and his 25% share of the said amount of Rs.36,00,000/- was duly credited in the Bank account of the assessee. Thereafter as per information flagged of Risk Management Strategy, the assesese sold the property through District Sub-Registration Office, Buxer valuing at Rs.1,62,50,000/- during the FY 2014-15. A show-cause notice was issued to the assessee under section 148A(b) of the Act, but the assessee did not respond due to lack of communication gap with his consultant. Again, notice under section 148 was issued to the assessee and the assessee filed his return of income disclosing income from other sources of Rs.1,86,690/-, i.e. below exemption limit and claimed exemption u/s 54 on capital gain of Rs.15,69,303/- for purchase of residential plot for consideration of Rs.15,00,000/- as per index cost which comes to Rs.24,93,197/-. Notices thereafter were issued for compliance but the assessee did not respond to the notices. Thereafter getting no response from the side of assessee, the ld. Assessing Officer passed the assessment order without giving exemption under section 54 on capital gain of Rs.15,69,303/- and added the whole amount of consideration of Rs.40,62,500/- as long-term capital gain of his 25% share in the hands of assessee. On being aggrieved, the assessee preferred an appeal before the ld. CIT(Appeals). ITA No. 31/PAT/2025 (A.Y. 2019-2020) Ramesh Dutt Pandey 3 3. The ld. CIT(Appeals) has given several opportunities to the assessee to substantiate his claim, but the appellant neither filed the written submission nor represented the case before the ld. CIT(Appeals). Thereafter the ld. CIT(Appeals) dismissed the appeal ex-parte on 10th January, 2025 for non-cooperative attitude of the assessee. 4. On being aggrieved, the assessee preferred an appeal before the ITAT. 5. At the time of hearing, ld. Counsel for the assessee prayed before the Bench that the impugned order be set aside and remitted back to the file of ld. CIT(Appeals) for deciding it afresh. 6. At the outset, ld. D.R. brought to my notice that the assessee did not produce the relevant documents as asked by the ld. Assessing Officer during the assessment proceedings. Therefore, the ld. Assessing Officer passed the assessment order without giving exemption under section 54 on capital gain of Rs.15,69,303/- and added the whole amount of consideration of Rs.40,62,500/- as long-term capital gain of 25% share of assessee and completed the assessment on a total income of Rs.42,49,190/- Thereafter the assessee preferred an appeal before the ld. CIT(Appeals). The ld. CIT(Appeals) has given many opportunities to the assessee and the assessee neither filed written submission nor any evidence before the ld. CIT(Appeals). He further submitted that before the ITAT, the assessee did not substantiate its claim. ITA No. 31/PAT/2025 (A.Y. 2019-2020) Ramesh Dutt Pandey 4 Therefore, he pleaded to uphold the order passed by the ld. CIT(Appeals). 7. We have heard the rival contentions and perused the material available on record. Considering the facts and circumstances of the case, we are inclined to set aside the order passed by the ld. CIT(Appeals) in order to meet the principle of natural justice, and remit the matter back to the file of ld. CIT(Appeals) with a direction to provide one more opportunity of being heard to the assessee. At the same breath, we also hereby caution the assessee to promptly co-operate with the proceedings before the Ld. CIT(Appeals) failing which the Ld. CIT(Appeals) shall be at liberty to pass appropriate order in accordance with law and merits based on the materials available on the record. Thus, the grounds raised by the assessee are allowed for statistical purposes. 8. In the result, the appeal of the assessee is allowed for statistical purposes. Order pronounced in the open Court on 26/05/2025. Sd/- Sd/- (Sanjay Awasthi) (Duvvuru RL Reddy) Accountant Member Vice-President (KZ) Kolkata, the 26th day of May, 2025 Copies to :(1) Ramesh Dutt Pandey, Bandha Patwa Road, Dunraon, Buxer-802119, Bihar ITA No. 31/PAT/2025 (A.Y. 2019-2020) Ramesh Dutt Pandey 5 (2) Income Tax Officer, NFAC, Delhi (3) Commissioner of Income Tax (Appeals), National Faceless Appeal Centre (NFAC), Delhi; (4) CIT - ; (5) The Departmental Representative; (6) Guard File TRUE COPY By order Assistant Registrar, Income Tax Appellate Tribunal, Kolkata Benches, Kolkata Laha/Sr. P.S. "