IMPORTANT POINT
The court emphasized that willful disobedience of its orders undermines the rule of law, leading to contempt charges against the opposite party for failing to comply with jurisdictional directives.

JUDGMENT :

Irshad Ali, J.

1. Heard Ms. Radhika Singh, learned counsel for the applicant and Shri Neerav Chitravanshi, learned counsel for the opposite party assisted by Shri Kushagra Dikshit, learned Advocate at length.

2. Order dated 1.11.2023 vide which charges have been framed, notices gist of the matter. The said order is extracted hereinbelow:

1. Heard Ms. Radhika Singh, learned Advocate for the applicant along with Sri Anand Prakash Sinha, learned Advocate and Shri Neerav Chitravanshi, learned counsel for the opposite party assisted by Shri Kushagra Dikshit, learned Advocate.

2. The present contempt application under Section 12 of the Contempt of Courts Act, 1971 has been filed alleging willful and deliberate disobedience of judgment and order dated 31.03.2015 passed by a Division Bench of this Court in Writ Petition No.9525 (MB) of 2013 whereby the following direction was issued:

"A perusal of Annexure SA-3 annexed with the supplementary affidavit dated 31.3.2015 shows that in response to the notice dated 3.11.2014, the petitioner preferred written objection to the Assessing Officer bringing to his notice the pendency of the aforesaid writ petition and also apprising him that Section 127 was not even remotely attracted. Therefore, it was incumbent upon the opposite party No.2 to have waited for the outcome of the writ petition, but he proceeded with the matter which shows prejudicial and impartial attitude of the authority. It may be noted that transparency and fairness is the essence of the state action. Therefore, the authorities are expected to proceed in disciplined manner without creating any doubt in the mind of the asseessees. As averred above, it was the duty of the Assessing Officer to have referred the question of jurisdiction to the Chief Commissioner or the Commissioner as the case may be under sub-section (2) of Section 124 of the Act and not doing so, this vitiated the further proceedings.

Here, there is complete departure from the settled procedure. It comes out from the record that when the petitioner refused to submit to the jurisdiction of the said Assessing Officer at Lucknow, the authority/respondent No.2 proceeded ex parte and dispatched a demand of almost Rs.52 lacs. At the cost of repetition, we would like to mention that in the notice dated 11.9.2013, which is computer generated clearly reveals that the Delhi address of the petitioner was scored out and in handwriting, the local address has been added. Therefore, it is incorrect to say that the Delhi Address was not in the knowledge of the respondents and we find force in the submissions of the petitioner that local address was inserted deliberately to create jurisdiction, which, in fact, legally was not vested with the opposite party No.2. Therefore, the opposite party No.2 exceeded its jurisdiction, which not only vitiates the impugned show cause notice but the entire proceedings. In these circumstances, the entire proceedings being ab initio illegal, without jurisdiction and in violation of Section 143 (1) (a) of the Income-tax Act.

For the reasons aforesaid, the writ petition is allowed and the impugned notice dated 11.9.2013 is quashed. As the notice notice has already been quashed, consequential orders, if any, are also quashed. "

3. This Court had, after several hearings, passed an order dated 22.09.2022 putting the respondent-contemnor to notice as to why the charge should not be framed against him for having willfully flouting the order dated 31.03.2015 passed by the writ Court. After hearing the counsel for the parties at length and examining the pleadings of the parties, an order dated 16.12.2022 was passed by this Court disposing of the contempt application and a fine of Rs.25000/- was awarded and the opposite party/ contemnor was ordered to undergo simple imprisonment for a period of one week. Thereafter, vide an order dated 17.01.2022 now the matter has to be heard afresh.

4. Ms. Radhika Singh, learned counsel for the applicant submitted that