Dept hauled up for CPC Fiasco & unnecessarily harassing assessee but spared of costs on the ground that AO & CIT(A) were “only doing their duty”

Ambala Central Cooperative Bank Ltd vs. ITO (ITAT Chandigarh)

The assessee filed an e-return disclosing income of Rs. Nil which was arrived at after setting off against the current year’s income of 9.53 crores, the brought forward losses of Rs. 12.43 crores. In the electronic processing, the loss set off was shown at Zero and a demand of Rs. 3 crores was raised. The assessee filed a rectification application u/s 154. The AO rejected the application on the ground that the assessee had “not claimed any loss” while the CIT (A) rejected it on the ground that “set off of losses cannot be a matter of rectification”. The assessee filed an appeal before the Tribunal and demanded costs u/s 254(2B) for the hardship. HELD by the Tribunal: