The Commissioner Of Income Tax-Iv v. I.c.s Hotels Pvt Ltd

$~ * IN THE HIGH COURT OF DELHI AT NEW DELHI 4.+ ITA 133/2016 THE COMMISSIONER OF INCOME TAX-IV ..... Appellant Through: Mr Rahul Chaudhary, Senior Standing Counsel with Mr Raghvendra Singh, Junior Standing Counsel and Mr Sharad Agarwal, Advocate. Through: Mr Rahul Chaudhary, Senior Standing Counsel with Mr Raghvendra Singh, Junior Standing Counsel and Mr Sharad Agarwal, Advocate. versus I.C.S HOTELS PVT LTD. ..... Respondent Through: Mr Salil Aggarwal and Mr Ravi Pratap, Advocates. Advocates. CORAM:JUSTICE S.MURALIDHAR JUSTICE VIBHU BAKHRU O R D E R% 15.02.2016 -CM No.4776/2016 (for condonation of delay in refiling the appeal) & ITA ITA 133/2016 1. There is an inordinate delay of 785 days in re-filing the appeal. 2. The Court finds that the standard excuse that the department is putting forth in all such applications for condonation of delay in re-filing the appeal is the change of Standing Counsel for the Department and the failure by the earlier counsel to inform the Department about the appeal lying in defect. This explanation does not impress the Court. It is not possible to accept that ITA 133/2016 Page 1 of 2 no one in the Department followed up on the filing of appeals and allowed a period of almost two years to elapse before the appeal could be re-filed. The Department has a cell in the High Court which is under the supervision of a Deputy CIT. He ought to be keeping track of the filing of appeals and should be able to know if any appeal entrusted to the panel counsel for filing has not been listed even once before the Court for a long time. 3. The application bearing CM No.4776/2016for condonation of the delay of 785 days in re-filing the appeal is dismissed. Accordingly, the appeal is dismissed. S.MURALIDHAR, J FEBRUARY 15, 2016 MK VIBHU BAKHRU, J ITA 133/2016 Page 2 of 2