MAHALAXMI JEWELLERS Vs. UNION OF INDIA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Petitioner-assessee, through its Proprietor Smt. Santosh Soni, has preferred this writ petition under Article 226 of the Constitution to assail summons dated 1st of March, 2019 (Annex. 3) and 26th of April, 2019 (Annex. 6), with a prayer to annul the same. Apart from that, the petitioner has also craved for quashment of consequential proceedings, undertaken by the respondent-Department, pursuant to impugned summons Annex. 3 and 6 respectively.

(2.) The facts, in brief, are that petitioner furnished its tax-return on 29th of October, 2018 for Assessment Year 2018-19 and, thereupon, as per return the income was accordingly assessed. Petitioner has averred in the petition that although no proceeding was pending against it before any authority under the Income-tax Act, 1961 (for short, 'Act'), yet a survey was carried at the business premises of the firm on 1st of March 2019 by resorting to Sec. 133(A) of the Act. It is further averred that during the course of survey, statements of Manager of the firm, i.e. petitioner's husband, were recorded, which were concurred by the petitioner as proprietor of the firm. Some queries were also made and answers thereto were solicited from petitioner and then she was served summons dated 1st and 5th of March, 2019 (Annex. 3 and 4) respectively under Sec. 131(1A) of the Act. As per version of the petitioner, impugned summons were issued by second respondent without any authority. Be that as it may, the petitioner challenged summons before this Court by filing Civil Writ Petition No. 4585/2019, which came up for consideration before Court on 23rd of April 2019, and the Court, after hearing rival contentions, decided the same. Operative part of order dated 23rd of April, 2019, reads as under:

(3.) Petitioner has further submitted that to camouflage mistake in issuing unauthorized summon, now summon (Annex. 6) under Sec. 131(1) of the Act is issued on 26th of April, 2019, asking the petitioner to furnish books of account and/or other documents with a word of caution that failure would entail penalty under Sec. 272A(1) of the Act. Summon (Annex. 6) is challenged on various counts including non-fulfillment of conditions under Sec. 131(1) of the Act. Besides that, the summon (Annex. 6) is also assailed on various grounds.