D. V. JUNNARKAR, A. M.: ex parte assessment under/s. 144 of IT Act was made in this case o n 30th March, 1983. assessee took two remedial measures against this assessment. He filed application under/s. 146 of IT Act on 26th June, 1983 before ITO for reopening assessment. ITO reopened assessment under/s. 146 of IT Act on 30th July, 1983. Simultaneously, assessee also filed appeal before AAC, who, after hearing assessee s representative, by his order dt. 20th Sept., 1983, held that assessment order for year under consideration was barred by limitation and therefore, it required to be annulled. It appears that AAC, who passed this order on 20th Sept., 1983 was Shri D. S. Rastogi, who was not aware of reopening of assessment by ITO on 30th July, 1983. Shri Rastogi appears to have been transferred and Smt. Meenakshi Singh took over post of AAC. She did not issue any fresh notices, but on perusal of record found that assessment had already been reopened by ITO under/s. 146 of IT Act. She, therefore, passed order on 28th Oct. 1983 to effect that since assessment had already been reopened by ITO under/s. 146, appeal filed by assessee had become infructuous. Therefore, she dismissed appeal. assessee has now filed appeal against order of AAC dt. 28th Oct., 1983 on ground that order of AAC was bad in law and without jurisdiction in view of fact that Shri D. S. Rastogi, previous AAC h s already annulled assessment on 20th Sept., 1983, Hence it was submitted that order passed by Smt. Meenakshi Singh on 28th Oct., 1983 should be quashed and set aside as it was without jurisdiction and was bad in law. During course of hearing, ld. counsel for assessee on 22nd Nov., 1983 wherein it was stated that since her predecessor had already dismissed (Sic) ITO s order under/s. 144 20th Sept., 1983, her order dt. 28th Oct., 1983 may be treated as order under/s. 154 of IT Act. ld. counsel for assessee has proceeded to argue that assessment under consideration was time barred and hence was without jurisdiction. effect of order under/s. 146 would be that ITO gets fresh opportunity of making fresh assessment after issuing fresh statutory notice, whereas order of AAC dt. 20th Sept. 1983 had annulled assessment leaving no right of further assessment of ITO. By present order of AAC dt. 28th Oct., 1983, assessee reverted to position of order under/s. 146 which was bad in law. Therefore, order of AAC dt. 28th Oct., 1983 should be cancelled. I have carefully considered facts and circumstances of case. original assessment under/s. 144 was made on 30th March, 1983. ITO had reopened assessment on 30th July, 1983. assessment, therefore, did not exist after that date. assessee s appeal before AAC was rendered infructuous after ITO s order under/s. 146. previous AAC should have taken pains to ascertain fate of assessee s application under s. 146 and then proceeded to hear appeal. He, proceeded to hear appeal against assessment order which no longer existed. Therefore, his order is also nullity. As regards validity of present order of AAC, to may mind, it is not statutory order at all. Having found that order under appeal before her, namely, assessment order dt. 30th March, 1983 had already been cancelled by ITO, appeal before her was rendered infructuous. She merely struck it off. This was administrative action . Therefore, nothing further requires to done about, it. In circumstances of case, she was justified in striking of appeal as infructuous. As to her letter dt. 22nd Nov., 1983 describing order as order under s. 154, I would refrain from making any comments as this is not in appeal before me. To my mind, however, contents of letter did not change complexion of case at all. Her order being just administrative direction to office to strike out appeal from registers calls for no interference. Hence, assessee s appeal is hereby dismissed. *** LIYAQUAT A. RANGOONWALA v. INCOME TAX OFFICER (THIRTEENTH)