HC set to pass order on Cong's pleas against tax re-assessment exercise

The Delhi High Court will pronounce its order on Friday on the Congress party challenging the reassessment proceedings against it by the Income Tax Department.

A bench of Justices Yashwant Varma and Purushaindra Kumar Kaurav is scheduled to pass its verdict at 2:15 PM.

The high court had reserved its order on March 20 on the pleas filed by the political party against the tax reassessment proceedings initiated against it by the authorities for three successive years, that is, 2014-15, 2015-16 and 2016-17.

The party has contested the reassessment proceedings, claiming they were barred by limitation.

Senior advocate Abhishek Singhvi, representing the Congress party, had submitted that tax reassessment proceedings are barred by limitation and the I-T department could have gone back to a maximum of six assessment years.

The I-T department, however, asserted there was no violation of any statutory provision by the tax authority and that as per the material recovered, the "escaped" income by the party is more than Rs 520 crore.

Recently, the high court had refused to interfere with the order of the Income Tax Appellate Tribunal declining to stay a notice issued by the Income Tax department to the Congress for recovery of outstanding tax of more than Rs 100 crore.

The assessing officer had raised a tax demand of more than Rs 100 crore for the assessment year 2018-19 when the income was assessed to be more than Rs 199 crore.