Point of Law: Power available to the Tribunal is not in the nature of a review as is understood in legal parlance. The power is limited to correction of mistakes apparent from the record. What is significant is that the section envisages amendment of the original order of the Tribunal and not a total substitution thereof.

JUDGMENT :

J.B.PARDIWALA, J.

1 By this writ application under Article 226 of the Constitution of India, the writ applicant has prayed for the following reliefs:

“(A) Issue a writ of certiorari and/or a writ of mandamus and/or any other writ direction or order to quash and set aside the impugned order dated 8.10.2018 passed by the Hon'ble Triunal in Misc. Application No.249 of 2017 annexed hereto at Annexure 'G' and thereby, directing the Hon'ble Tribunal for de novo adjudication with regard to addition of Rs.67,59,613/on account of suppression in the valuation of closing stock after giving opportunity of hearing to assessee and Revenue.

(B) Pending admission, hearing and disposal of this petition, adinterim relief be granted and the respondent No.2 be ordered to restrain from enforcing compliance of impugned order dated 8.10.2018 passed by the Hon'ble Tribunal in Misc. Application No.249 of 2017 annexed hereto at Annexure 'G'.

(C) Award the cost of this petition.

(D) Grant such other and further reliefs as this Hon'ble Court deems fit.”

2 The facts giving rise to this writ application may be summarised as under:

2.1 The writ applicant is a partnership firm and is being regularly assessed to tax. The firm filed its return of income on 16th September 2011 declaring the total income at Rs.5,69,038/. The return filed by the firm was processed under Section 143(1) of the Income Tax Act, 1961 (for short, 'the Act'). The Assessing Officer passed an order under Section 143(3) of the Act on 27th March 2014.

3. We take notice of the fact that several additions were made in the assessment order passed by the Assessing Officer. The firm preferred an appeal before the CIT (Appeals). The CIT (Appeals) dismissed the appeal filed by the firm vide order dated 30th March 2016. However, it appears that even while dismissing the appeal, the CIT (Appeals) granted relief to the firm with reference to the addition account of under statement of net profit by lowering the value of closing stock. By doing so, it confirmed the addition of Rs.67,59,613/.

4. The firm, being dissatisfied with the order passed by the CIT (Appeals), preferred appeal before the Appellate Authority. Before the Appellate Authority, three specific grounds as under were raised:

“1. The Ld. CIT(A) erred on facts and in law in confirming addition of Rs.69,93,910/by holding purchase of raw cotton from the partners to be bogus.

2. The Ld. CIT(A) erred on facts and in law in confirming addition of Rs.10,81,710/by holding purchase of raw cotton from the relatives of the partners to be unexplained / unsubstantiated.

3. The Ld. CIT(A) erred on facts and in law in confirming addition of Rs.67,59,613/for alleged suppression in value of closing stock by discarding / disregarding the method of valuation consistently followed in and accepted in past assessments.”

5. The Appellate Authority partly allowed the appeal filed by the firm holding as under:

“11. In the present case, ld. CIT(A) has rightly observed that the assessee has not followed either of the method of valuation of closing stock, i.e., either on the basis of cost price or market price, whichever is lower, rather the assessee has followed net realizable value which is purely an adhoc method and without any basis. He also held that the net realization method is neither based on cost price nor calculated on the basis of market price; thus, there is no scientific method of calculation of the net realizable value. In view of these facts and circumstances of the case and considering the judgment of Hon'ble Supreme Court in the case of Hindustan Zinc Ltd (supra), we do not find any infirmity in the orders of the authorities below in this regard. This ground of appeal of the assessee is accordingly rejected.”

6. The firm noticed that the ground No.3 referred to above had not been discussed at all by the Appellate Tribunal.

7. In such circumstances, the firm filed a Miscellaneous Application under Section 254 of the Act. In the Miscellaneous Application