‘True Copies’ submitted before Income Tax Authorities do not have Evidentiary Value: ITAT

The Income Tax Appellate Tribunal (ITAT), Ahmedabad bench has held that the “true copies” submitted before the income tax authorities do not have evidentiary value under the Income Tax Act, 1961.

A division bench of the Tribunal comprising Smt Annapurna Gupta (Accountant Member) and Shri Mahavir Prasad (Judicial Member) was considering an appeal by Smt. Nitaben Shaileshbhai Patel wherein the assessee’s case was reopened under section 147 of the Act on account of cash deposits in her bank account and in the absence of any explanation thereof, addition accordingly was made of the cash deposits amounting to Rs.18,63,000/- and further on account of sundry creditors amounting to Rs.81,24,561/-which remained unexplained. The assessee had originally filed return of income of Rs.1,39,140/- and the impugned addition made by the AO resulted in assessed income at Rs.1,01,26,701/-. These additions were upheld by the CIT(A) also in the absence of any justification or pleadings against the same made by the assessee before him.

Dismissing the appeal, the Tribunal observed that the assessee has chosen to make this plea of restoring her matter to the lower authorities before us without even making any effort to substantiate the explanation offered.

“All documents filed before us in support of her case as mentioned above are only stated as being “true-copies”. Even the affidavit filed by the assessee before us, stating allegedly on oath the reason for non compliance to notices of authorities below, we find, is not original copy, but only mentioned as “true copy”. Such documents have no evidentiary value. It is the assessee who has sought redressal of her grievance against orders of the IT authorities by filing appeal before us. The assessee cannot sit back after filing the appeal seeking adjournment time and again and by simply filing written submissions to make a plea totally unsupported and unsubstantiated. It seems that the assessee has chosen to ignore the gravity of the situation despite being aware of it, which is evident by the fact that she has repeatedly filed appeal before the first appellate authority and also before us,” the Tribunal said.