IN THE INCOME TAX APPELLATE TRIBUNAL, DELHI BENCH: “SMC” NEW DELHI BEFORE SHRI SATBEER SINGH GODARA, JUDICIAL MEMBER Assessment Year: 2012-13 Assessment Year: 2012-13 Assessment Year: 2012-13 Assessment Year: 2012-13 Assessment Year: 2012-13 Assessment Year: 2012-13 Assessment Year: 2012-13 Assessment Year: 2012-13 Assessment Year: 2012-13 Assessee by Sh. Ankit Kumar, Adv.

Department by Sh. Manoj Kumar, Sr. DR Date of hearing 19.01.2026 Date of pronouncement 19.01.2026

ORDER

This assessee’s appeal for assessment year 2012-13, arises against the Commissioner of Income Tax (Appeals)-3 [in short, the “CIT(A)”], Gurgaon’s order dated 11.11.2025 passed in case no. 11089/CIT(A)-3/GGN/2019-20, involving proceedings under section 143(3)/147 of the Income-tax Act, 1961 (hereinafter referred to as ‘the Act’).

Heard both the parties. Case file perused.

2. Coming to the first and foremost issue of validity of learned ITO, Ward-19(2), Delhi’s assessment framed on 26.12.2019, learned counsel quotes the CBDT’s landmark circular No. 1 of 2011 that going by the pecuniary jurisdiction of the departmental authorities for the purpose of framing assessment, it is clear that any return involving more than 20 lakhs income disclosure had to be acted upon and assessed by the Assistant or Deputy Commissioner; as the case may be. The Revenue fails to rebut this clinching factual position. That being the case, it is noticed that the tribunal’s recent order in M/s. Orchids Diamond Tools (P) Ltd. VS ITO (ITA No.2416/Del/2025) decided on 30^th December, 2025, has already adjudicated the very issue in assessee’s favour and against the department, as under:

“7. Considered the rival submissions and material placed on record. We observe that assessment was completed by the Assessing Officer - ITO, Ward 19(2), Delhi vide order dated 26.12.2019. We observe that as per the CBDT Instruction No.1/2011 dated 31.01.2011 u/s 119 of the Act in the present case, the assessee has declared returned loss of Rs.1,84,94,762/- and as per the Instruction, income upto Rs.30,00,000/- is with the ITOs and anything above Rs.30,00,000/-, assessment has to be completed by ACs/DCs. In the given case, we observed that as per the income declared by the assessee, the jurisdiction falls under ACs/DCs. In the given case, the assessment was completed by ITO, Ward 19 (2), Delhi. Considering the peculiar facts on record, we observe that actual jurisdiction lies with ACs/DCs and it is beyond the jurisdiction of ITOs. Therefore, notice u/s 143(2) to assess the income of the assessee is beyond the jurisdiction of the ITO. Therefore, the jurisdiction notice u/s 143(2) is bad in law and accordingly even assessment order passed with wrong jurisdiction is bad in law. In this regard, we rely on the decision of ITAT, Delhi Bench in the case of Vipul Mittal vs. DCIT in ITA No.2850/Del/2019 dated 15.01.2025 wherein it was held as under :-

“14. Considered the rival submissions and material placed on record. We observed that assessee has filed its return of income declaring income of Rs.59,68,220/-. As per the CBDT Instruction No.01/2011, the jurisdiction over the assessee’s case lies only with Assistant/Deputy Commissioner of Income-tax as the income declared by the assessee is above Rs.20 lakhs falls under the category of non-corporate returns. It is brought to our notice that notice u/s 143(2) was issued by the ITO, Ward 11 (3) on 28.08.2015, who do not have jurisdiction over the assessee in the case considering the fact that the return of income declared by the assessee is over and above Rs.20 lakhs. The assessment was completed by the DCIT, Circle 11 (2), New Delhi u/s 143(3) of the Act. However, we observed that the jurisdiction lies only with DCIT, however the statutory notice u/s 143(2) was issued by the ITO instead of the present Assessing Officer i.e. DCIT. In this regard, the Assessing Officer also filed the submissions which are placed on record in which it was submitted that as per the PAN based ju