Supreme Court: In a case where the assessment order for actor Amitabh Bachchan’s income in the year 2001-2002 was in question, the bench of Ranjan Gogoi and P.C. Pant, JJ held that the Commissioner of Income Tax (CIT) is empowered to revise the said order under Section 263 of the Income Tax Act, 1961 as making a claim which would prima facie disclose that the expenses in respect of which deduction has been claimed has been incurred and thereafter abandoning/withdrawing the same gives rise to the necessity of further enquiry in the interest of the Revenue.
The assessee, in his earlier stand had stated that the expenses incurred were for security purposes and that payments have been made out of cash balances available and later, by a re-revised return, he withdrew his claims, acting upon which, the Assessing Officer abandoned the enquiry.
Explaining the law on revisional power of CIT, the Court said that There can be no doubt that so long as the view taken by the Assessing Officer is a possible view the same ought not to be interfered with by the Commissioner under Section 263 of the Act merely on the ground that there is another possible view of the matter. Permitting exercise of revisional power in a situation where two views are possible would really amount to conferring some kind of an appellate power in the revisional authority which is a course of action that must be desisted from. However, the Court said that the present case was an exceptional one and required a revision as the matter had not been investigated by the Assessing Officer and that the notice issued under Section 69-C of the Act could not have been simply dropped on the ground that the claim has been withdrawn. [Commissioner of Income Tax v. Amitabh Bachchan, 2016 SCC OnLine SC 484, decided on 11.05.2016]
