Jurisdiction tested before merits
Limitation, sanction and procedure are examined first, because objections not raised before the assessment is framed are harder to run afterwards.
Tax & Regulatory
Direct Tax Advisory & Litigation Support
Written direct tax positions, and the drafting and evidence work behind a dispute: reassessment responses, appeal grounds and statements of fact, paper books, stay applications, and briefing counsel where a hearing requires it.
Overview
Two statutes are now running at once. The Income-tax Act 2025 governs tax years from April 2026, while every assessment, reassessment and appeal already in the system continues under the 1961 Act as though the new Act had not been passed.
That is the practical reality of a direct tax dispute in 2026. A company can be answering a scrutiny notice under one statute, filing a return under another, and reading a reassessment notice whose limitation and approval requirements sit in the earlier law. Section numbers have moved: reassessment now runs through Sections 279 to 284, appeals to the Commissioner (Appeals) through Sections 356 to 360, appeals to the Appellate Tribunal through Sections 361 to 364, revision through Section 377. The forms moved too. Getting a citation wrong in a submission does not lose a case, but it tells the officer reading it how carefully the rest was prepared.
This engagement covers the written position before a transaction, and the drafting, evidence and research work when a position is challenged.
Scope of engagement
- Written opinions on the taxability of a specific transaction, with the reasoning, the contrary view, and the disclosure the position requires.
- Response to summary-processing intimations: reconciliation to the annual tax statement, identification of adjustments arising from the audit report, and rectification where the demand is a mismatch rather than a dispute.
- Scrutiny assessment support: preparation of replies to notices and questionnaires, assembly of the supporting evidence, and drafting of written submissions for filing through the faceless portal.
- Reassessment work: examining the information relied on, the show-cause stage and the reply, the limitation period against the quantum of escaped income alleged, and the level at which sanction was granted.
- Additions under the unexplained income provisions, now Sections 102 to 106, where the burden is on the company to explain nature and source. This is a documentation exercise before it is a legal one.
- Grounds of appeal and statement of facts for the first appellate stage, prepared with the assessment order read against the record rather than against the summary.
- Paper book preparation, evidence index and legal research memoranda for appeals to the Appellate Tribunal, and written briefing of counsel.
- Applications for stay of demand and for the demand to be kept in abeyance while an appeal is pending, with the financial position evidenced.
- Reconstruction of the demand register year by year where refunds have been adjusted against demands that are stale, paid or duplicated.
- Penalty defence, including the distinction between under-reporting and misreporting and the immunity route where it remains available.
- Withholding tax positions and defaults, now consolidated in Section 393, including short deduction, late deposit and consequential disallowance.
- Tax audit support and the annual reporting pack, now filed in the consolidated audit form under the Income-tax Rules 2026.
Deliverables
- A written opinion setting out the position, the authority for it, the argument against it, and what has to be disclosed and retained.
- Drafted replies and written submissions in filing-ready form, with the annexures numbered and cross-referenced to the text.
- Grounds of appeal and a statement of facts drafted for the first appellate stage.
- A paper book with an evidence index, prepared to the Tribunal’s filing conventions.
- A legal research memorandum arranging the case law by proposition, with the adverse authorities identified rather than omitted.
- A written brief to counsel covering the facts, the record, the issues, and the questions likely to come from the bench.
- A stay application with the supporting financial statements and the computation of what is offered.
- A dispute register listing every open year, the issue, the amount, the stage, the next date, and the assessed likelihood.
Process
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Record reconstruction
We work from the assessment record, not the order. Notices, replies filed, evidence produced, dates of service. Most weaknesses in a case are procedural and appear only when the file is read in sequence.
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Position assessment
Each issue is separated and assessed on its own facts, with the tax, interest and penalty exposure quantified. You receive a written view on which issues are worth contesting before any drafting starts.
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Drafting
Grounds, statement of facts, submissions and the research memorandum. Every factual assertion is tied to a page of the paper book, because an assertion that cannot be located in the record is treated as unsupported.
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Recovery management
Filing an appeal does not stop recovery. The stay application, the part-payment position and the refund adjustment history are dealt with in parallel with the appeal itself.
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Hearing support
Where the matter is argued, counsel is briefed in writing and in conference. We prepare the supplementary submissions arising from the hearing and the compliance to any direction given.
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Closure and carry-forward
The finding is applied to open and future years, the return position is corrected where the outcome requires it, and the documentation gap that produced the dispute is closed.
Benefits
Submissions tied to the record
Every factual statement is referenced to a page of the paper book, which is the difference between an argument and an assertion.
A decision on what to contest
Exposure is quantified issue by issue against the cost of carrying it, so the choice to litigate is a commercial one rather than a reflex.
Demand managed in parallel
Stay, part payment and refund adjustments are handled alongside the appeal instead of being discovered when a refund fails to arrive.
Industries served
Manufacturing, where the recurring issues are capital versus revenue expenditure, depreciation on plant, and disallowance for late deposit of statutory dues. Financial services, where they are provisioning, interest recognition on non-performing exposures, and the treatment of income deferred across years. Real estate and infrastructure, where they are the point at which revenue is recognised, project-level interest capitalisation, and the treatment of joint development arrangements. We also act for technology and software, healthcare, retail and e-commerce, and growth companies facing scrutiny for the first time after a funding round.
Typical timeline
- Scoping call and document list: next business day after enquiry.
- Written opinion on a defined transaction: 3 to 6 weeks from receipt of the complete records.
- Reply to a scrutiny or reassessment notice: 10 to 20 business days, and faster where the notice date requires it.
- Grounds of appeal, statement of facts and the accompanying paper book: within 15 business days of instruction, subject to the appeal period available.
- Stay application: prepared within 5 business days of the demand being raised, since recovery does not wait for the appeal to be heard.
- Appellate outcomes are outside our control. Listing and disposal timelines are set by the forum, and we do not predict them.
Engagement model
Advisory opinions are contracted at a fixed fee against a written scope. Dispute work is contracted per matter, per year and per stage, so an appeal for one assessment year at the first appellate stage is a defined engagement with a defined output. Where several years turn on the same issue, the research is done once and priced once.
Delivery is virtual. Records are exchanged through a controlled folder, drafts are issued for your approval before anything is filed, and filings are made through your own portal credentials. Counsel, where a matter requires advocacy, is engaged by you directly; we brief and we do not mark up.
What is not included
- Advocacy. We do not argue matters before the Tribunal or any court, and we do not instruct counsel in your name without your written authority.
- Counsel’s fees, court fees, filing fees and the appeal fee payable to the forum.
- Payment of tax, interest or penalty. We compute and advise; the funds move from your account.
- Any assurance about outcome, listing date or disposal timeline. No prediction is offered and none should be inferred.
- Prosecution proceedings and matters under the Black Money Act or the Benami Transactions legislation.
- Search, survey and seizure proceedings while they are in progress.
- Settlement negotiations conducted outside the statutory framework.
- Advice on a position we consider unsustainable. We will explain why, in writing, and decline to draft it.
- Book-keeping, return preparation and routine withholding compliance, which are contracted separately.
Frequently asked questions
No. The savings provision directs that proceedings pending before an income-tax authority, the Appellate Tribunal or a court continue and are disposed of as if the new Act had not been enacted. Nothing is re-filed. Your appeal against a 1961 Act order is still argued on 1961 Act provisions and 1961 Act precedent. What changes is the citation discipline in anything drafted now, because two statutes are running side by side.
It is, but an appeal is often the wrong first move. A summary-processing intimation usually reflects a mismatch the department can correct without a hearing: a tax credit not picked up from the annual tax statement, a disallowance flagged by the audit report, an arithmetical adjustment. Rectification is faster and cheaper. We test which route applies before the appeal window runs, because the window does not pause while a rectification is pending.
No. We do not appear before the Tribunal or any court as counsel, and we do not hold ourselves out as doing so. What we provide is the work that decides those hearings: grounds of appeal, the statement of facts, the paper book and evidence index, the legal research memorandum, and a written brief for counsel. We attend conferences with counsel and prepare the responses to questions raised from the bench.
Set-off of a refund against an outstanding demand requires prior intimation and an opportunity to respond. Where that did not happen, the adjustment is challengeable on that ground alone. In practice the demand itself is often stale, already paid, or duplicated across years on the portal. We reconstruct the demand history year by year from the assessment records, then pursue correction of the register rather than only contesting the set-off.
By comparing three numbers against the strength of the position: the tax and interest at stake, the penalty exposure if the addition stands and is treated as misreporting, and the cost of carrying the dispute through the appellate stages. A weak position on a small amount is usually settled. A strong position on a small amount may still be worth contesting where the same issue repeats in later years, because the finding travels.
It means every part of a case except advocacy. We reconstruct the facts from primary records, draft the grounds and the statement of facts, prepare the paper book with a proper evidence index, research and write the legal memorandum with the case law arranged by proposition, draft the stay application, and brief counsel in writing. Counsel argues. Work requiring a registered signatory is performed and signed by a professional holding the relevant registration.
Jurisdiction, before merits. The information relied on, whether the show-cause stage was properly followed and the reply considered, whether the notice is within the limitation period applicable to the quantum of income alleged to have escaped, and whether the specified authority approved it at the correct level. Reassessment is defeated on these points more often than on the substantive addition, and the objections have to be raised before the assessment is framed.
Related services
Tax Notice & Assessment Representation
Where a notice has arrived with a deadline and the immediate need is a filed response rather than an opinion.
Forensic Advisory & Investigation
Where an addition turns on transactions whose nature and source have to be traced through the records before they can be explained.
Accounting & Assurance Advisory
Where the dispute rests on an accounting treatment that has to be defended on its own terms first.