Kerala H.C : The challenge essentially is to what had happened in 1967 and what had been reaffirmed in 1981. Looking from that view also, it is difficult for this Court to enthusiastically entertain this writ petition.

K. SUKUMARAN, J.:

Notwithstanding the vigorous arguments supported by profuse case law, I am disinclined to admit this writ petition. The petitioner’s father was a partner in a firm and had been assessed to income-tax. That was, however, a story of long time back in 1957-58. Tax remaining unpaid, recovery proceedings were set in motion. Things drifted like that till 17th March, 1967, when the property referred to in the original petition was brought to sale. Soon thereafter, the assessee bid goodbye to all his earthly worries. It was thereafter that the legal representative takes on his further fights. He did it repeatedly. Apparently, it was unsuccessful, as is evident from the suit, the appeal and second appeal and the decisions of the Courts therein. The sale having been held on 17th March, 1967, it had been duly confirmed later.

The civil litigation having not yielded any good results, the petitioner felt like challenging the entirety of the recovery action by putting forward jurisdictional missile in the forefront. According to him, Schedule II procedure, more benevolent and more benign to the assessee, should have been pursued rather than the procedural formalities as visualised under the Revenue Recovery Act. The authority of the Tahsildar as a functionary under certificate proceedings is, however, conceded. It has to be noted that the assessment did pertain to the asst. yr. 1957-58, a period much prior to the enactment and enforcement of the provisions of Schedule II to the IT Act, 1961. If, in the light of the existing provisions, the recovery officials pursued the steps without demur, doubt or dispute and if the proceedings had resulted in a sale which has become final almost two decades earlier, this Court should be slow in upsetting the entirety of the proceedings at the instance of a person who did not take timely action to ventilate his grievances or who has taken erroneous steps and got defeated in that process.

The challenge essentially is to what had happened in 1967 and what had been reaffirmed in 1981. Looking from that view also, it is difficult for this Court to enthusiastically entertain this writ petition. The absence of a substantial grievance, as is evident from the broader facts available, is another strong and dissuading factor for rejecting the writ petition.

The writ petition is dismissed.

[Citation :181 ITR 82]