My case was transferred under section 127 to an Assessing Officer in another state — which High Court now hears the appeal against the Tribunal's order?
The High Court where the Assessing Officer who passed the assessment order sits. The Supreme Court held on 18 August 2022 that an appeal under section 260A lies only to that High Court, and that a transfer of the case under section 127 does not shift appellate jurisdiction — even a transfer for the same assessment year. The Delhi High Court's contrary decisions in CIT v. Sahara India Financial Corporation Ltd. and CIT v. Aar Bee Industries Ltd. were overruled. Nor does the location of the Tribunal decide the forum, since a Bench of the Tribunal often covers several states.
Decided by the Supreme Court (Supreme Court of India; Uday Umesh Lalit, S. Ravindra Bhat and Pamidighantam Sri Narasimha JJ, judgment delivered by Narasimha J) on 2022-08-18, reported as Civil Appeal No. 4252 of 2022 (arising out of SLP (C) No. 23352 of 2019), with Civil Appeal No. 4253 of 2022 and Civil Appeal No. 3480 of 2022. It bears on section 260A, section 127, section 116 of the Income Tax Act 1961, in Appeals matters.
Section 260A does not say which High Court an appeal lies to, and Benches of the Tribunal sit for more than one state. Before this decision an assessee whose file had been centralised could be shuttled between High Courts, each declining jurisdiction on the strength of its own precedent — which is exactly what happened here, with Punjab and Haryana and Delhi both refusing the same appeal. The judgment fixes a single, stable test: look at the Assessing Officer who made the assessment order under appeal, and nothing else. It settles the conflict between the Punjab and Haryana line and the Delhi line, overrules Sahara and Aar Bee, and confirms that the observations in the cases tying jurisdiction to the seat of the Tribunal are obiter. It also states a constitutional principle worth keeping: the executive cannot, by an administrative transfer, choose which court hears an appeal.
Binding on every court and authority in India.
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The assessee manufactures writing and printing paper. For assessment year 2008-09 it was assessed by the Deputy Commissioner, Circle-1(1), New Delhi, by order of 30 December 2010; the Commissioner (Appeals), New Delhi allowed its appeal on 16 February 2012, and the Tribunal, New Delhi dismissed the Revenue's appeal on 11 May 2017. Meanwhile a search was carried out in May 2011 at the assessee's Chandigarh office and premises in Punjab, and by an order of 26 June 2013 under section 127 the Commissioner (Central), Ludhiana centralised the assessee's cases for assessment years 2006-07 to 2013-14 with the Central Circle, Ghaziabad. That officer passed an assessment on 31 March 2015, which the Commissioner (Appeals), Kanpur set aside, and the Tribunal, New Delhi again dismissed the Revenue's appeal on 1 September 2017. The files were then re-transferred to Chandigarh. The Revenue appealed to the Punjab and Haryana High Court, which held on 7 February 2019 that it had no jurisdiction; the Delhi High Court, on its own precedents, also declined jurisdiction on 21 May 2019.
Appeals against every decision of the Tribunal lie only to the High Court within whose jurisdiction the Assessing Officer who passed the assessment order is situated. A transfer of a case under section 127, including a transfer for the same assessment year or years, does not move that appellate jurisdiction. The Delhi High Court's decisions in Sahara India Financial Corporation Ltd. and Aar Bee Industries Ltd. do not lay down the correct law and were overruled. The observations in Parke Davis, ABC India, J.L. Marrison, Akzo Nobel, Sungard Solutions and Shree Ganapati Rolling Mills suggesting that the appeal follows the seat of the Tribunal are obiter. On the facts, the two appeals against the Punjab and Haryana High Court's refusal were dismissed, with directions that the appropriate forums were the Delhi High Court and the Lucknow Bench of the Allahabad High Court respectively; the appeal against the Delhi High Court's refusal was allowed and that Court directed to hear the appeal.
The Court separated the administrative from the judicial. Section 127 sits in Chapter XIII, which deals with income tax authorities — section 116 lists them, section 120 fixes their jurisdiction, section 124 that of Assessing Officers. Everything in that chapter concerns executive power. The Delhi High Court's error in Sahara was to give the word "case" in the Explanation to section 127(4) an overarching sense that swept in proceedings before the Tribunal and the High Court as well, so that a transfer moved the file lock, stock and barrel. That misreads the section: the judicial remedies are in Chapter XX, and the vesting of appellate jurisdiction has nothing to do with Chapter XIII. Two further reasons supported the result. First, consistency: a High Court's decisions bind the Assessing Officer, the Commissioner (Appeals) and the Tribunal within its territory, and those forums work as one unit under it; if appellate jurisdiction followed the transferee officer, a High Court outside that territory would correct principles it could not bind anyone to apply. The chain from Assessing Officer to High Court is a lineal progression of judicial remedies expressing the High Court's superintendence over the authorities in its territory. Second, independence: to hold otherwise would let the executive decide which court hears an appeal, since a section 127 transfer is a pure executive act. A constitutional court should not read a judicial remedy so that the identity of the appellate forum vacillates with the exercise of some other power. The jurisdiction of the High Court stands on its own footing under section 260A read with section 269.
Appeals against every decision of the ITAT shall lie only before the High Court within whose jurisdiction the Assessing Officer who passed the assessment order is situated.
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Handle my notice → Ask a CA on WhatsAppThe High Court where the Assessing Officer who passed the assessment order sits. The Supreme Court held on 18 August 2022 that an appeal under section 260A lies only to that High Court, and that a transfer of the case under section 127 does not shift appellate jurisdiction — even a transfer for the same assessment year. The Delhi High Court's contrary decisions in CIT v. Sahara India Financial Corporation Ltd. and CIT v. Aar Bee Industries Ltd. were overruled. Nor does the location of the Tribunal decide the forum, since a Bench of the Tribunal often covers several states. This was decided by the Supreme Court (Supreme Court of India; Uday Umesh Lalit, S. Ravindra Bhat and Pamidighantam Sri Narasimha JJ, judgment delivered by Narasimha J) and bears on section 260A, section 127, section 116 of the Income Tax Act 1961. It is reported as Civil Appeal No. 4252 of 2022 (arising out of SLP (C) No. 23352 of 2019), with Civil Appeal No. 4253 of 2022 and Civil Appeal No. 3480 of 2022. Section 260A does not say which High Court an appeal lies to, and Benches of the Tribunal sit for more than one state. Before this decision an assessee whose file had been centralised could be shuttled between High Courts, each declining jurisdiction on the strength of its own precedent — which is exactly what happened here, with Punjab and Haryana and Delhi both refusing the same appeal. The judgment fixes a single, stable test: look at the Assessing Officer who made the assessment order under appeal, and nothing else. It settles the conflict between the Punjab and Haryana line and the Delhi line, overrules Sahara and Aar Bee, and confirms that the observations in the cases tying jurisdiction to the seat of the Tribunal are obiter. It also states a constitutional principle worth keeping: the executive cannot, by an administrative transfer, choose which court hears an appeal. If it applies to you, the first step is this: Identify the Assessing Officer who passed the assessment order under appeal and file the section 260A appeal in that High Court, whatever has since happened under section 127.
The assessee manufactures writing and printing paper. For assessment year 2008-09 it was assessed by the Deputy Commissioner, Circle-1(1), New Delhi, by order of 30 December 2010; the Commissioner (Appeals), New Delhi allowed its appeal on 16 February 2012, and the Tribunal, New Delhi dismissed the Revenue's appeal on 11 May 2017. Meanwhile a search was carried out in May 2011 at the assessee's Chandigarh office and premises in Punjab, and by an order of 26 June 2013 under section 127 the Commissioner (Central), Ludhiana centralised the assessee's cases for assessment years 2006-07 to 2013-14 with the Central Circle, Ghaziabad. That officer passed an assessment on 31 March 2015, which the Commissioner (Appeals), Kanpur set aside, and the Tribunal, New Delhi again dismissed the Revenue's appeal on 1 September 2017. The files were then re-transferred to Chandigarh. The Revenue appealed to the Punjab and Haryana High Court, which held on 7 February 2019 that it had no jurisdiction; the Delhi High Court, on its own precedents, also declined jurisdiction on 21 May 2019. The matter was decided on 2022-08-18 by the Supreme Court (Supreme Court of India; Uday Umesh Lalit, S. Ravindra Bhat and Pamidighantam Sri Narasimha JJ, judgment delivered by Narasimha J). On those facts the Supreme Court held as follows. Appeals against every decision of the Tribunal lie only to the High Court within whose jurisdiction the Assessing Officer who passed the assessment order is situated. A transfer of a case under section 127, including a transfer for the same assessment year or years, does not move that appellate jurisdiction. The Delhi High Court's decisions in Sahara India Financial Corporation Ltd. and Aar Bee Industries Ltd. do not lay down the correct law and were overruled. The observations in Parke Davis, ABC India, J.L. Marrison, Akzo Nobel, Sungard Solutions and Shree Ganapati Rolling Mills suggesting that the appeal follows the seat of the Tribunal are obiter. On the facts, the two appeals against the Punjab and Haryana High Court's refusal were dismissed, with directions that the appropriate forums were the Delhi High Court and the Lucknow Bench of the Allahabad High Court respectively; the appeal against the Delhi High Court's refusal was allowed and that Court directed to hear the appeal.
The Court separated the administrative from the judicial. Section 127 sits in Chapter XIII, which deals with income tax authorities — section 116 lists them, section 120 fixes their jurisdiction, section 124 that of Assessing Officers. Everything in that chapter concerns executive power. The Delhi High Court's error in Sahara was to give the word "case" in the Explanation to section 127(4) an overarching sense that swept in proceedings before the Tribunal and the High Court as well, so that a transfer moved the file lock, stock and barrel. That misreads the section: the judicial remedies are in Chapter XX, and the vesting of appellate jurisdiction has nothing to do with Chapter XIII. Two further reasons supported the result. First, consistency: a High Court's decisions bind the Assessing Officer, the Commissioner (Appeals) and the Tribunal within its territory, and those forums work as one unit under it; if appellate jurisdiction followed the transferee officer, a High Court outside that territory would correct principles it could not bind anyone to apply. The chain from Assessing Officer to High Court is a lineal progression of judicial remedies expressing the High Court's superintendence over the authorities in its territory. Second, independence: to hold otherwise would let the executive decide which court hears an appeal, since a section 127 transfer is a pure executive act. A constitutional court should not read a judicial remedy so that the identity of the appellate forum vacillates with the exercise of some other power. The jurisdiction of the High Court stands on its own footing under section 260A read with section 269. In the words reproduced by the source cited on this page: "Appeals against every decision of the ITAT shall lie only before the High Court within whose jurisdiction the Assessing Officer who passed the assessment order is situated."
It was decided by the Supreme Court on 2022-08-18 and is reported as Civil Appeal No. 4252 of 2022 (arising out of SLP (C) No. 23352 of 2019), with Civil Appeal No. 4253 of 2022 and Civil Appeal No. 3480 of 2022. Binding on every court and authority in India. A Supreme Court decision binds every assessing officer, every Commissioner (Appeals), every bench of the Income Tax Appellate Tribunal and every High Court in India. An officer who declines to follow it is acting contrary to law, and that refusal is itself a ground of appeal. On section 260A, section 127, section 116, the practical question is whether the facts of your own notice match the facts of this case closely enough for the same rule to apply.
It cuts both ways and is cited by both sides. Appeals against every decision of the Tribunal lie only to the High Court within whose jurisdiction the Assessing Officer who passed the assessment order is situated. A transfer of a case under section 127, including a transfer for the same assessment year or years, does not move that appellate jurisdiction. The Delhi High Court's decisions in Sahara India Financial Corporation Ltd. and Aar Bee Industries Ltd. do not lay down the correct law and were overruled. The observations in Parke Davis, ABC India, J.L. Marrison, Akzo Nobel, Sungard Solutions and Shree Ganapati Rolling Mills suggesting that the appeal follows the seat of the Tribunal are obiter. On the facts, the two appeals against the Punjab and Haryana High Court's refusal were dismissed, with directions that the appropriate forums were the Delhi High Court and the Lucknow Bench of the Allahabad High Court respectively; the appeal against the Delhi High Court's refusal was allowed and that Court directed to hear the appeal. It arises in Appeals matters, on section 260A, section 127, section 116 of the Income Tax Act 1961, and was decided by Supreme Court of India; Uday Umesh Lalit, S. Ravindra Bhat and Pamidighantam Sri Narasimha JJ, judgment delivered by Narasimha J. Before relying on it, read the source linked on this page and check whether it has since been distinguished, overruled or overtaken by an amendment to the Income Tax Act. In practice the steps that follow from it are these. Where different assessment years were assessed by officers in different states, expect different High Courts for different years — file separately rather than clubbing them. If an appeal was dismissed for want of territorial jurisdiction on the Sahara or Aar Bee reasoning, take this judgment and seek to have the appeal entertained on the correct footing. Do not file in the High Court where the Tribunal Bench sits merely because that is convenient; the seat of the Tribunal is irrelevant.
Still good law. A citator search returns 128 later decisions citing the judgment, 79 of them from the Supreme Court and the High Courts, the most recent a Chennai Tribunal order of 11 March 2026. In income tax it governs Tribunal practice: the Chennai Tribunal, 'respectfully following the judgement of the Hon'ble Supreme Court in the case of Pr. CIT vs. ABC Papers Limited', held the Revenue's appeals not maintainable before the Chennai Bench and directed them to be refiled before the Kolkata Bench (11 March 2026), and the Pune Tribunal applied it to identify the jurisdictional High Court in ITO v Padmakar Wamanrao Honerao (23 August 2023). It has not, however, been carried across into Waqf appeals as the earlier note suggested: in Maharashtra State Board of Waqfs v Mohammed Peerbhoy Fancy Wakf (Bombay High Court, Aurangabad Bench, 24 November 2025) the Bench set out its holding and then declined to follow it, holding that because the Waqf Tribunal is a single statewide tribunal seated at Aurangabad, jurisdiction follows the seat of the tribunal of first instance; the preliminary objection based on it was rejected. Nothing overruling, doubting or confining the judgment was found. No source could be cited for that finding. Checking whether an authority still stands matters as much as knowing what it held: a decision may be overruled on one point and survive on another, or the provision it interprets may have been amended since. Read the source and the editor's note on this page before relying on it in a reply to an Assessing Officer or in an appeal.
The harvested text is clipped: about 11,324 characters from the middle are missing, covering part of the Court's survey of the earlier High Court decisions and the submissions. The opening, the facts, the analysis from paragraph 25 onward and the full operative directions are present, so the ratio and the order are complete. No reporter citations were harvested; the appeal numbers come from the judgment's first page. One oddity in the text: paragraph 4 describes ABC Papers Ltd as "the Appellant" although it is the respondent in the lead appeal — a slip in the judgment, not in the record above. This library shows the verification state of every entry openly. This entry has not yet been read in full by a chartered accountant. The summary reflects the sources listed on this page. Read the source before you rely on it in a reply to an Assessing Officer or in an appeal before the Commissioner (Appeals) or the Income Tax Appellate Tribunal.
Appeals against every decision of the Tribunal lie only to the High Court within whose jurisdiction the Assessing Officer who passed the assessment order is situated. A transfer of a case under section 127, including a transfer for the same assessment year or years, does not move that appellate jurisdiction. The Delhi High Court's decisions in Sahara India Financial Corporation Ltd. and Aar Bee Industries Ltd. do not lay down the correct law and were overruled. The observations in Parke Davis, ABC India, J.L. Marrison, Akzo Nobel, Sungard Solutions and Shree Ganapati Rolling Mills suggesting that the appeal follows the seat of the Tribunal are obiter. On the facts, the two appeals against the Punjab and Haryana High Court's refusal were dismissed, with directions that the appropriate forums were the Delhi High Court and the Lucknow Bench of the Allahabad High Court respectively; the appeal against the Delhi High Court's refusal was allowed and that Court directed to hear the appeal.
TaxSphere, “PCIT v ABC Papers Ltd”, https://taxnotice.vittsphere.com/caselaw/case/pcit-v-abc-papers-ltd/ (validity last checked 2026-08-29)
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