Section 273 — Faceless Assessment. Successor to s.144B of the 1961 Act.
Section 273 is in Chapter XVI — Procedure for Assessment, which runs from section 268 to section 301.
Sub-section (1) overrides anything to the contrary in the Act and requires assessment, reassessment or recomputation under section 270(10), 271 or 279 to be made in a faceless manner as per the prescribed procedure, in the cases covered by sub-section (2). Sub-section (2) leaves it to the Board to specify the territorial area, persons or class of persons, incomes or class of incomes, or cases or class of cases to which faceless assessment applies.
Sub-section (3) lets the Board set up, and specify the functions and jurisdiction of, a Centre and four kinds of unit. The National Faceless Assessment Centre conducts the proceedings centrally — assigning a selected case to a specific assessment unit, intimating the assessee that the assessment will be completed under this section, serving notice under section 268(1) or 270(8), and forwarding the assessee's responses to the assessment unit. Assessment units make the assessment: analysing material furnished by the assessee or anyone else, identifying material points or issues, seeking information or clarification on them, and determining any variation prejudicial to the assessee. Verification units carry out enquiry, cross verification, examination of books of account and of witnesses, and recording of statements. Technical units give assistance or advice on legal, accounting, forensic, information technology, valuation, transfer pricing, data analytics, management or other technical matters, including on an agreement entered into under section 159. Review units review a variation proposed by an assessment unit where the Centre considers it necessary, checking whether the relevant and material evidence is on record, whether the points of fact and law have been incorporated, and whether the issues requiring addition or disallowance have been included.
Sub-section (4) divides the work: the verification, technical and review units facilitate, while the assessment unit makes the assessment of total income or loss by an order in writing after taking into account all relevant material it has gathered and after giving the assessee an opportunity of being heard, may also initiate penalty proceedings, and determines the sum payable or the refund due. Sub-section (5) provides that each of the four units means an Assessing Officer with powers so assigned by the Board, and sub-section (6) lists the authorities they comprise — Additional or Joint Commissioners and Directors; Deputy or Assistant Commissioners and Directors and Income-tax Officers; and such other income-tax authority, ministerial staff, executive or consultant as the Board considers necessary.
Sub-section (7) channels the communications. All communications among the units, and with the assessee or any other person, go through the National Faceless Assessment Centre; those between the Centre and the assessee, his authorised representative or any other person, and those between the Centre and the units, are exchanged exclusively by electronic mode. Sub-section (8) takes enquiry or verification conducted by the verification unit out of sub-section (7) in the circumstances specified by the Board.
Sub-sections (9) to (12) provide the exits. Where the Principal Chief Commissioner or Principal Director General in charge of the Centre considers it appropriate that section 268(5) may be invoked, he either forwards the assessment unit's reference to the Principal Chief Commissioner, Chief Commissioner, Principal Commissioner or Commissioner having jurisdiction over the case and informs the unit, or transfers the case to the jurisdictional Assessing Officer under sub-section (12). On receiving such a reference that officer directs the jurisdictional Assessing Officer to invoke section 268(1); where no reference is forwarded, the assessment unit completes the assessment under this section. Sub-section (12) allows the officer in charge of the Centre, irrespective of sub-sections (1) and (2), to transfer the case to the jurisdictional Assessing Officer at any stage of the assessment, with the prior approval of the Board.
Sub-section (13) defines "designated portal", "faceless assessment" — proceedings conducted electronically in the "e-Proceeding" facility through the assessee's registered account on that portal — and "registered account".
The section removes the personal interface between the assessee and the officer deciding his case, and replaces it with a single Centre through which everything passes and a set of specialised units none of which meets the assessee. The unit structure separates the making of an assessment from verification, technical opinion and review; the communication rules make the record of the proceeding the only channel; and the exit routes in sub-sections (9) to (12) keep a way back to the jurisdictional Assessing Officer where the case needs one.
Two things decide real cases here. First, the hearing survives the format: sub-section (4)(b)(i) requires the assessment unit to give the assessee an opportunity of being heard before it makes the order, and sub-section (7) requires every communication with the assessee to pass through the National Faceless Assessment Centre and to be exchanged exclusively by electronic mode. What counts as the proceeding is defined narrowly by sub-section (13)(b) — electronic proceedings in the "e-Proceeding" facility through the assessee's registered account on the designated portal. Second, faceless is not a one-way door. Sub-section (12) allows the officer in charge of the Centre to transfer the case to the jurisdictional Assessing Officer at any stage with the Board's prior approval, and sub-sections (9) and (10) route a case out where section 268(5) is thought to be in point. The one exception to the communication rule is sub-section (8), which frees verification-unit enquiry and verification from sub-section (7) in circumstances the Board specifies.
A company's case is selected for faceless assessment. The National Faceless Assessment Centre assigns it to an assessment unit and serves the notice under section 268(1) through the company's registered account on the designated portal. The assessment unit seeks a valuation opinion from a technical unit, and a variation it proposes is sent to a review unit; the company's replies go back through the Centre, never to a unit directly. Before the order is made the assessment unit must give the company an opportunity of being heard under sub-section (4)(b)(i). If the officer in charge of the Centre later considers section 268(5) may be invoked, the case can be referred out under sub-section (9) or transferred to the jurisdictional Assessing Officer under sub-section (12) with the Board's prior approval.
You meet this section as the notice and the assessment order themselves — served through your registered account on the designated portal, issued by the National Faceless Assessment Centre rather than by a named local officer, with every submission and hearing in the "e-Proceeding" facility.
make the assessment of the total income or loss by an order in writing after taking into account all relevant material which it has gathered and after giving the assessee an opportunity of being heard
between the National Faceless Assessment Centre and the assessee, or his authorised representative, or any other person shall be exchanged exclusively by electronic mode
may, at any stage of the assessment, if considered necessary, transfer the case to the Assessing Officer having jurisdiction over such case, with the prior approval of the Board
"faceless assessment" means the assessment proceedings conducted electronically in "e-Proceeding" facility through registered account of the assessee in designated portal
See the full 1961 to 2025 concordance.
All of them are in the Rules 2026 index.
See the notifications index.