Writ Maintainable After Income Tax Assessment If Order Is Ex Facie Without Jurisdiction: Delhi High Court

The Delhi High Court has held that a writ petition under Article 226 is maintainable even after completion of assessment proceedings, where the impugned action is ex facie without jurisdiction.

A Division Bench of Justices Dinesh Mehta and Vinod Kumar observed that “simply because the proceedings have culminated into an assessment order, the petitioner cannot be made to suffer the agony of an order which is without jurisdiction on the face of it, until the appellate authority does a formal act of annulling it.”

The Court made the observation while allowing a writ petition challenging reassessment proceedings initiated under Section 148 of the Income Tax Act, 1961 for Assessment Year 2016–17.

Petitioner assailed the reassessment notice dated August 30, 2024 and the consequent assessment order dated March 29, 2026, primarily on the ground that the notice was issued beyond the prescribed period of limitation and was therefore void.

It was argued that although this objection had been specifically raised before the Assessing Officer during the proceedings, the same was not considered.

The Revenue raised a preliminary objection to the maintainability of the writ petition, contending that the petitioner had approached the High Court after the assessment order had already been passed and ought to avail the statutory appellate remedy.

The Court noted that the initiation of reassessment proceedings itself was fundamentally flawed, as the notice under Section 148 had been issued beyond the limitation period.

“Requiring the petitioner to take up the formality rather rigmarole of the appellate proceedings when the facts are crystal clear, would be iniquitous in the present factual matrix,” it said.

Reliance was placed on Executive Engineer v. Seetaram Rice Mill (2012) where the Supreme Court upheld the High Court's action in entertaining a writ petition challenging a show cause notice and provisional assessment on the ground of lack of jurisdiction.

Accordingly, the Court allowed the writ petition and quashed both the reassessment notice and the consequential assessment order.

For Petitioner: Advocates Rohit Tiwari, Kanika Jain and Saurabh D. Karan Singh

For Respondent: Advocates Ruchir Bhatia SSC with Anant Mann and Pratyaksh Gupta, JSCs