PRAKASH NARAIN, A.M. assessee is HUF. It was subjected to two search operations. first search was conducted by police in 1975. other search was conducted by IT Department on 10th Aug., 1983 under s. 132(1) of IT Act, 1961. ITO examined books of account found in two searches in details, books of account of first search were also handed over to him. Finally, he issued notice under s. 143(3) of Act to assessee on 29th Dec., 1984. It was served on assessee on 31st Dec., 1984. Through this notice, ITO required assessee to answer number of queries. notice itself ran into 6 pages. first point required explanation in notice related to status of assessee. second point related to various credits about nature and source of which explanation was required from assessee. compliance for above notice was to be made on 25th Jan., 1985. assessee sent detailed reply to above notice on 25th Jan., 1985. I n this reply it raised several preliminary objections to validity of notice itself. first objection was that assessee was not liable to any proceedings with regard to income computed under s. 132(5) of Act, as order passed under above section had been set aside by CIT (notified authority under s. 132(11) of Act). next preliminary objection was that assessee could not be proceeded against in view of presumption contained in s. 132(4A) of Act. assessee's case was that books of account and other documents had been found in possession of firm with which assessee had nothing to do. It was claim of assessee that income, if any, determined from assets and books of account found in search could be assessed only in hands of firm from whose custody they had been recovered and not in hands of assessee. Another objection was that entries found in books of account had also to be presumed to be correct in view of presumption contained in above s. 132(4A). After raising there presumptions, assessee also included following submission in reply: "However, in case you do not find it possible to agree to our submissions to decide issue raised herein as preliminary issue, you may kindly give us at least one month's time to file comprehensive reply to notice under reply which runs into six pages and contains large number of queries with respect to asst. yrs. 1970-71 to 1984-85. It is not possible for us to give detailed reply to all these queries in such short time." assessee, however, also gave some basic facts regarding status and some brief reply to queries raised by ITO. There was no response from side of ITO till 25th Feb., 1985. On 25th Feb., 1985, ITO wrote letter to assessee stating that notice under s. 143(3) dt. 29th Dec., 1984 had already been served on assessee by which it was required to prove genuineness of deposits in certain accounts. It was further stated in letter that after further scrutiny of accounts some other deposits were found. assessee was required to prove genuineness of these deposits also. Compliance to this letter was required o n 3rd March, 1985. assessee did not submit any reply to this letter. ITO thereafter proceeded to make all assessments and completed them on 23rd March, 1985. assessee appealed to CIT(A) who fixed hearing of appeals on 9/10th Sept., 1985 at his camp Jhansi for which notices were served on assessee on 26th Aug., 1985. On 9th Sept., 1985 appeals in individual case of Shri Ratan Lal Agrawal were also fixed. On that date Shri Jeewan Lal, Accountant, who also held general power of attorney from assessee, filed request for adjournment under signature of Shri R.G. Godbole, Advocate of Allahabad. application for adjournment was accompanied by vakalatnama. vakalatnama, of course, did not mention whether it was filed on behalf of Shri Ratan Lal Agrawal (Individual) or Ratan Lal Agrawal (HUF), latter being assessee before us. request for adjournment was made on ground that because of his illness counsel could not move out of Allahabad. Adjournment was sought in first week of October, 1985. CIT(A) rejected request for adjournment. first objection was that there was only on vakalatnama and one request. Since vakalatnama did not mention status to which it related, CIT(A) took it against Shri Ratan Lal Agrawal (Individual). He observed in his order that Shri Jeewan Lal, Accountant, had agreed that he was fully conversant with case and he would represent appeals in both cases. He accordingly proceeded to hear case. On 11th Sept., 1985 again letter from Shri Godbole dt. 10th Sept., 1985 was filed inclosing therewith copy of written submissions. Shri Godbole again requested for adjournment because of setback in his health. This request was also rejected by CIT(A) on two grounds. first ground was that he had not filed any vakalatnama to represent appeals filed by HUF. second ground was that there was no justification for adjourning hearing. Thereafter, hearing proceeded before CIT(A) because of full co- operation extended to him by accountant, Shri Jeewan Lal. He finally decided appeals on 12th Sept., 1985. One of contentions before CIT(A) was that ITO had not given full opportunity to assessee to lead all possible evidences to prove credit entries in seized books of account. After analysing facts of case, he held that ITO was perfectly justified to apply provisions of s. 68 of Act. He accordingly rejected above contention. assessee is now in appeal before us. first submission based on aforesaid facts before us is that neither ITO nor CIT(A) had allowed proper opportunity of being heard to assessee and, therefore, principle of natural justice had been grossly violated by both of them. It was submitted before us by counsel, Shri R.G. Godbole himself that ITO after having received assessee's reply dt. 25th Jan., 1985 was bound to allow another opportunity to assessee to explain deposits and credits. His grievance was that such opportunity, though technically allowed, was illusory. He made similar grievance against findings of CIT(A) also. On behalf of Department, reliance was placed by ld. Departmental representative on orders of authorities below. We have given our consideration to rival submissions placed before us. W e are of opinion that neither ITO nor CIT(A) had allowed proper opportunity of being heard to assessee. We are in agreement with submissions of ld. counsel for assessee that principle of natural justice has been violated in this case. first notice requiring assessee to submit replies on several issues covering asst. yrs. 1970-71 to 1984-85 was served on assessee on 31st Dec., 1984. compliance was required by 25th Jan., 1985. assessee was, thus, allowed period of 24 days only which, in our opinion, itself was not sufficient. However, assessee did reply to this letter raising several preliminary objections which we have stated above. It was clearly stated in reply that in case ITO did not find possible to agree to submissions contained in reply, fresh opportunity of about one month might be allowed to assessee. It appears that ITO did not allow any such opportunity to assessee. On other hand, he wrote letter to assessee only on 25th Feb., 1985 giving details of further credits found by him. Proof of genuineness of these credits/deposits was required by 3rd March, 1985. In other words, for compliance to this letter only five days were allowed, if we presume that letter was served on assessee on 25th Feb., 1985 itself. This is absolutely inadequate period for compliance when matter related to as many as 13 years. We do not see any reason why ITO could not allow sufficient time to assessee when searches had taken place in 1975 and 1983. Our finding, therefore, is that opportunity allowed to assessee was too inadequate. His (ITO) orders cannot, therefore, be upheld on this preliminary ground itself. matter must be restored back to his file for making fresh assessments in accordance with law after allowing assessee proper opportunity of being heard. We are not satisfied with manner in which this important issue was decided by CIT(A). He has not discussed matter in manner we have done and his incorrectly came to conclusion that ITO was justified in applying provisions of s. 68 of Act to case. In above connection, we may also deal with nature of opportunity allowed by CIT(A) himself. His notice of hearing was served on 26th Aug., 1985. Appeals were fixed on 9/10th Sept., 1985. That means there was period of only 13 days to assessee to engage counsel and brief him for large number of years. counsel was from Allahabad, although case was fixed at Jhansi. We also do not know why application of counsel seeking adjournment by about month was rejected when it was on ground of his illness. reasons advanced by CIT(A) for refusal of adjournment do not appeal to us. His first reason was that there was only one vakalatnama. If that was position, we do not understand why it was not taken as relating to assessee-HUF itself. If CIT(A) could take it as relating to individual status of Shri Ratan Lal, he could as well take it as relating to assessee-HUF which was bigger case. In fact, we are of opinion that he had no authority to presume that vakalatnama related to individual and not to HUF. We also do not approve of his approach to decide appeals with help of Accountant only on ground that latter was fully conversant with facts and extended his full cooperation in matter. CIT(A) was to act in judicious manner. It was not only co-operation of Accountant, which was necessary, but it is subtle arguments and handling of case by expert such as Advocate which are prime requirements when case is to be dealt with in judicious manner. CIT(A) has denied, though inadvertently, such opportunity to assessee for no fault of it. It is, therefore, not possible for us to uphold his order also on ground that proper opportunity of being heard has not been allowed to assessee. orders of lower authorities are, therefore, set aside and matter is restored to file of ITO, as already stated above, with direction to make fresh assessment in accordance with law after allowing assessee opportunity of being heard. In result, all appeals are partly allowed. *** RATAN LAL AGARWAL (HUF) v. INCOME TAX OFFICER