Skip to main content
Indian Kanoon - Search engine for Indian Law
Document Fragment View
Matching Fragments
"It seems to us that the correct approach to
questions of this kind is this. If there is an entry in
the account books of the assessee which shows
the receipt of a sum on conversion of high
denomination notes tendered for conversion by
the assessee himself, it is necessary for the
assessee to establish, if asked; what the source of
that money is and to prove that it does not bear
the nature of income. The department is not at
this stage required to prove anything. It can ask
the assessee to bring any books of account or
other documents or evidence pertinent to the
explanation if one is furnished, and examine the
evidence and the explanation. If the explanation
shows that the receipt was not. of an income
nature, the department cannot act unreasonably
and reject that explanation to hold that it was
income. If, however, the explanation is
.
unconvincing and one which deserves to be
rejected, the department can reject it and draw
the inference that the amount represents income
either from the sources already disclosed by the
assessee or from some undisclosed source. The
department does, not then proceed on no
of
evidence, because the fact that there was receipt
of money is itself evidence against the assessee.
There is thus, prima facie, evidence against the
rt
assessee which he fails to rebut, and being
unrebutted, that evidence can be used against
him by holding that it was a receipt of an income
nature. The very words 'an undisclosed source'
show that the disclosure must come from the
assessee and not from the department. In cases of
high denomination notes, where the business and
the state of accounts and dealings of the assessee
justify a reasonable inference that he might have
for convenience kept the whole or a part of a
particular sum in high denomination notes, the
assessee prima facie discharges his initial burden
when he proves the balance and that it might
reasonably have been kept in high denomination
notes. Before the department rejects such
evidence, it must either show an inherent
weakness in the explanation or rebut it by putting
to the assessee some information or evidence
which it has in its possession. The department
cannot by merely rejecting unreasonably a good
explanation, convert good proof into no proof."