The Court emphasized the importance of adhering to the stipulated limitation period for filing appeals, but also considered the Assessee's decision not to press the objection as to the delay in filing the appeals.

S. MURALIDHAR, J.

1. These are three appeals by the Appellant, Revenue, against the common order dated 29th April 2014 passed by the Income Tax Appellate Tribunal (ITAT) in ITA Nos. 4545, 4246 and 4247/Del/2012 for the Assessment Years (AYs) 2007-08, 2008-09 and 2009-10 respectively.

Limitation

2. Considering that the impugned order is dated 29th April 2014 and the appeals were first listed for hearing nearly a year later on 10th April 2015, the question whether the appeals were in time was examined by the Court. In para 8 of the memorandum of appeal in each of the appeals it is stated that the impugned order was received by the Appellant, i.e. the Commissioner of Income Tax, Delhi-3 (CIT-3) on 24th November 2014. The affidavit in support of the appeal has been signed by Mr. Narendra Prasad Sinha, posted as CIT-3.

3. Enclosed with the memorandum of appeal, is a copy of the certified copy of the impugned order of ITAT which bears different date stamps. One of them is a date stamp of the CIT-3 dated 1st August 2014. Next to it, is a noting of 5th August 2014 asking the matter to be put up for appeal effect urgently. However, also enclosed is a copy of a covering letter dated 24th November 2014 from the Income Tax Officer (ITO), Headquarters-8 (Judicial), New Delhi addressed to the CIT-III (Post restructured) drawing the attention of the latter to the ITATs order in the cases of the present Respondent, Five Vision Promoters Pvt. Ltd. (Five Vision).

4. By an order dated 9th October 2015 the Court required Mr. Kamal Sawhney, learned Senior standing counsel for the Revenue, to produce the certified copy of the order of the ITAT in original with the date stamp to show when it was received by the CIT-3. On the next date, i.e. 17th November 2015, Mr. Sawhney sought more time for that purpose. The Court was not inclined to grant further time for that purpose and decided to proceed on the basis of the documents already on record.

5. It appears from the covering letter dated 24th November 2014 of the ITO (Judicial) that cases concerning Five Vision were under the jurisdiction of the ACIT/DCIT, Circle-9 (1) Pre restructured Cir.11 (1). The letter stated that it was not known whether a copy of the consolidated order of ITAT had been forwarded to the concerned CIT. Therefore, a letter was again being written to the CIT-III (Post restructured). However, as noticed earlier CIT-III had already received a copy of the order on 1st August 2014 itself. In any event, going by the earliest of the date stamps on the certified copy of the impugned order of the ITAT, it is seen that it was first received by the CIT (Judicial) on 10th June 2014. That should normally be taken to be the date of commencement of limitation for the purposes of Section 260A (2) (a) of the Act. On that basis, the appeal filed on 19th March 2015, with the supporting affidavit attested on 31st March 2015 would be beyond the stipulated limitation period of 120 days in terms of Section 260A (2) (a) of the Act. There is, however, no application for condonation of delay and the appeals have been numbered and listed by the Registry as if they were within limitation.

6. Faced with the above difficulty, Mr. Sawhney, learned Senior standing counsel for the Revenue, volunteered to file a separate application for condonation of delay. However, at that stage Mr. C.S. Aggarwal, learned Senior counsel appearing for the Assessee, Five Vision, made a statement that the Assessee was not pressing the objection as to the delay in filing the appeals. In that view of the matter, the Court proceeds with the merits of the appeals. However, the Registry is directed to hereafter examine carefully the date stamp on the certified copy of the order of the ITAT and insist on the original being produced in order to satisfy itself of the correctness of the statement made in the memorandum of ap