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24. The second aspect of the explanation of the assessee was that full particulars of the fixed deposits and interest earned thereon were voluntarily disclosed by the assessee in the revised returns prior to the issued of notice under Section 148. In my view, this explanation also had no legs to stand; A valid revised return can be filed under Section 139(5} before the expiry of one year from the end of the assessment year or before the completion of the assessment whichever is earlier. This clearly means that revised return cannot be filed after the completion of the assessment proceedings. That is what the Hon'ble Supreme Court also held in the case of Esthuri Aswathiah v. JTO (1961) 41 ITR 539 (SC). The relevant portion of the judgment appearing at p. 543 to 544 is being reproduced as under :

26. There is another aspect of this matter that the chart appearing at p. 17 of this order shows that returns for asst. yrs. 1985-86, 1988-89 and 1989-90 were filed beyond the due date specified under Section 139(1). Therefore, such returns were belated returns and can be said to have been filed under Section 139(4) only. The Hon'ble Supreme Court in a recent judgment in the case of Kumar Jagdishchandra Sinha v. CIT (1996) 220 ITR 67 (SC) has held that revised return could not be validly filed where the assessee had not filed the return within the specified time under Section 139(1). Therefore, even on this ground, the assessee was not entitled to file revised returns for these years.

28. In. view of the above discussion, in my opinion, none of the aspects of assessee's explanation was relevant for dropping the penalty proceedings. Consequently, the CIT was legally justified in assuming jurisdiction under Section 263 by holding that the impugned order of the AO was erroneous and prejudicial to the interest of Revenue inasmuch as the assessee had not disclosed the particulars of his income in the original return and there was no valid disclosure in the so-called revised returns.

(i) Concealment of particulars of income has to be seen with reference to the original return filed by the assessee. The legal fiction created by Explanation to Section 271(l}(c) can be invoked for holding that particulars of income were concealed by the assessee at the time when original returns were filed.

(ii) A valid revised return can be filed under Section 139(5) before the expiry of one year from the end of the assessment year or before the completion of the assessment whichever is earlier. A revised return cannot be filed after the completion of the assessment proceedings.