Delhi HC reserves order on Congress plea against I-T Dept’s order of opening assessment proceedings of 2014 to 2017

New Delhi [India], March 20 (ANI): The Delhi High Court on Wednesday reserved the order on a plea moved by the Indian National Congress (INC) Party against the Income Tax Department order opening assessment proceedings for years 2014-2015, 2015-2016, and 2016-2017.

The bench of Justice Yashwant Verma and Justice Purushaindra Kumar Kaurav, after hearing the initial submissions, reserved the order in the matter. Senior Advocate Abhishek Manu Singhvi appeared for the Congress party and Special Counsel Zoheb Hossain appeared for the Income Tax Department on the matter.

Singhvi submitted that the reassessment action of the income tax department is “barred by limitation,” as they could have gone back to a maximum of six assessment years.

After the bench query, the IT Department apprised the court that, as per the seized material, the amount is about Rs. 520 crore.

In the morning today, the Congress party has also challenged four further years of re-assessment initiated by the Income Tax Department. The Delhi High Court will hear that petition on Thursday.

Last week, the Delhi High Court upheld the Income Tax Appellate Tribunal (ITAT) order refusing to stay on the Income Tax notice for recovery of more than Rs 105 crore as an outstanding tax against INC. The Court, while upholding the ITAT order, granted liberty to the petitioner’s Congress party to move the Appellate Tribunal afresh with the grievance.

The Congress has recently approached the Income Tax Appellate Tribunal (ITAT) against the recovery and has filed a complaint and sought a stay against Income Tax Department proceedings of recovery and freezing of their bank accounts.

In the complaint, Congress said the Income Tax Department has enforced its law by encashing some of the balances lying with the banks without waiting for the outcome of the hearing scheduled before the bench. Congress appealed that the department should not proceed further until the disposal of the stay application.