COMMISSIONER OF INCOME TAX Vs. MOHAMMAD IQBAL

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS is an income-tax reference at the instance of the Revenue and the following two questions of law have been referred by the Tribunal before this court for answer, which read as under :

(2.) THE brief facts giving rise to this reference are thus : THE assessment year involved is 1978-79 in the cases of all the three assessees, viz., Kalekhan, Mohd. Hanif, Mohd: Idris and Mohd. Iqbal. THE appeals of the assessees regarding their objections to the amount of income assessed and interest levied by the Income-tax Officer were dismissed by the Commissioner of Income-tax (Appeals), and second appeals were filed before the Tribunal on -the same objections. During the course of hearing of these appeals, the assessees sought permission of the Tribunal to raise the preliminary objection by way of additional grounds that the order of the Income-tax Officer was barred by limitation and hence, is a nullity and that as a consequence of the above ground, all taxes paid by the assessee whether before or after the assessment, be kindly directed to be refunded. Thus, this additional plea of limitation was permitted by the Tribunal and the Tribunal ultimately passed an order on May 22, 1986, and allowed the appeals. THEreafter, an application for rectification under Section 254(2) of the Income-tax Act was filed and it was pleaded that the additional grounds should not have been permitted to be raised in all these appeals and that was rejected by the Tribunal. Hence, the aforesaid questions of law have been referred for answer of this court.