The TPO's order was one day late. Does that kill the transfer pricing addition?
Yes. The sixty days run backwards from the s.153 limitation date, excluding that date itself, so an order passed on the sixtieth day is out of time. The requirement is mandatory, not directory, limitation goes to jurisdiction, and an order a single day late is non est along with everything built on it. That was the law when the case was decided and it remains the reasoning of the judgment, but as at 8 September 2026 the arithmetic no longer holds where the limitation date is 31 March or 31 December: s.92CA(3AA), inserted retrospectively from 1 June 2007 by the Finance Act 2026, fixes the count for those two dates and gives the officer one day more. It says nothing about a 30 September expiry, where this decision still governs.
Decided by the High Court (Madras High Court — single judge, Anita Sumanth J; affirmed by a Division Bench of the Madras High Court in writ appeal) on 2020-09-07, reported as [2021] 124 taxmann.com 536 (Madras) / (2021) 433 ITR 28 (Madras); W.P. Nos. 32699, 33751, 34174, 34389, 34568 and 32703 of 2019, order of 7 September 2020. It bears on section 92CA, section 92CA(3A), section 92CA(4), section 153, section 153(1), section 144C of the Income Tax Act 1961, in Assessment & Scrutiny and How Tax Law Is Read matters.
It converts a date arithmetic point into a complete answer on a transfer pricing addition, without touching the merits of the benchmarking. The reasoning is that the sixty days exist to leave the AO time to frame the draft order, so compressing them defeats the scheme of s.92CA read with ss.144C and 153. Do the date check on every transfer pricing assessment before drafting anything on comparables. Note the date: as at 8 September 2026 the arithmetic itself has been overtaken by s.92CA(3AA) for 31 March and 31 December expiries, but the mandatory character of the sixty days — which is what makes the check worth doing at all — is untouched by that amendment.
Binding within that High Court's jurisdiction. Persuasive elsewhere.
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This was a batch of writ petitions by several assessees, of which Pfizer Healthcare India was petitioner in W.P. Nos. 32699 and 32703 of 2019. For assessment year 2016-17 the returns included income from transactions with associated entities abroad, so references were made to the Transfer Pricing Officer, who passed orders under s.92CA(3) on 1 November 2019. The period for completing the assessment under s.153(1) was 21 months from the end of the assessment year, expiring on 31 December 2019. Section 92CA(3A) requires the transfer pricing order to be made 'at any time before sixty days prior to' the date on which that limitation expires. The petitioners said the orders were out of time by a single day; the revenue said limitation expired at 12 a.m. on 1 January 2020, so that sixty days back was 2 November 2019 and an order of 1 November was in time. Some petitioners also alleged breach of natural justice because the Transfer Pricing Officer's notices issued close to the limitation date. A separate ground taken by the revenue was that the sixty-day period was directory only.
The writ petitions were held maintainable notwithstanding the alternative remedy before the Dispute Resolution Panel, limitation being a question with no factual dispute (para 21). The sixty-day period in s.92CA(3A) was held not to be directory or a rough guideline; s.144C prescribes mandatory time limits before and after the transfer pricing order and the legislative intention is to fast-track such assessments (para 29). On computation, the period of 21 months expires on 31 December 2019 and that date must itself be excluded, because s.92CA(3A) speaks of an order 'before 60 days prior to' the date on which the s.153 limitation expires; excluding 31 December 2019, the sixty days expire on 1 November 2019, so the transfer pricing orders had to be passed on 31 October 2019 or earlier (para 30). The orders of 1 November 2019 were therefore barred by limitation. The writ petitions were allowed and the impugned orders quashed, except two - W.P. No. 35420 of 2019 (Verizon Data Services India) and W.P. No. 35272 of 2019 (TVS Motor Company), where the petitioners had already taken statutory remedies and their petitions were closed to let them pursue those (para 32).
The Court began from the structure of the Act: limitation is prescribed at every stage of an assessment involving transfer pricing - the return, the transfer pricing proceedings, objections under s.144C(2), the final order under s.144C(4), directions of the Dispute Resolution Panel under s.144C(12) and the final order under s.144C(13) - so such an assessment is measured by limitation at every step (para 22). It then reviewed the authorities on 'may' and 'shall', which establish that the word used is not decisive and that the scheme, object and consequences govern (paras 23 to 28). Applying that, it held the sixty-day period mandatory: transfer pricing assessments are a distinct, specialised and deliberately fast-tracked stream with a dedicated set of officers and a panel constituted for timely dispute resolution, and in that scheme the sixty days cannot be a guideline (para 29). On the arithmetic, the Court reasoned that an assessment must be complete before 11.59.59 p.m. on 31 December 2019, so the 21 months expire on that day; and because s.92CA(3A) requires the order 'before 60 days prior to' that date, 31 December itself is excluded from the count. Counting back sixty days from that exclusion brings the period to an end on 1 November 2019, so the order had to be passed on 31 October 2019 or before. The Court noted that the Board's own Central Action Plan gave 31 October 2019 as the date by which transfer pricing audits time-barred that year were to be completed (para 30). It rejected the revenue's reliance on s.92CA(4) and on the argument that the sixty days served only the internal convenience of officers.
The period of 21 months therefore, expires on 31-12-2019 that must stand excluded since section 92CA(3A) states 'before 60 days prior to the date on which the period of limitation referred to section 153 expires'. Excluding 31-12-2019, the period of 60 days would expire on 1-11-2019 and the transfer pricing orders thus ought to have been passed on 31-10-2019 or any date prior thereto.
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Handle my notice → Ask a CA on WhatsAppYes. The sixty days run backwards from the s.153 limitation date, excluding that date itself, so an order passed on the sixtieth day is out of time. The requirement is mandatory, not directory, limitation goes to jurisdiction, and an order a single day late is non est along with everything built on it. That was the law when the case was decided and it remains the reasoning of the judgment, but as at 8 September 2026 the arithmetic no longer holds where the limitation date is 31 March or 31 December: s.92CA(3AA), inserted retrospectively from 1 June 2007 by the Finance Act 2026, fixes the count for those two dates and gives the officer one day more. It says nothing about a 30 September expiry, where this decision still governs. This was decided by the High Court (Madras High Court — single judge, Anita Sumanth J; affirmed by a Division Bench of the Madras High Court in writ appeal) and bears on section 92CA, section 92CA(3A), section 92CA(4), section 153, section 153(1), section 144C of the Income Tax Act 1961. It is reported as [2021] 124 taxmann.com 536 (Madras) / (2021) 433 ITR 28 (Madras); W.P. Nos. 32699, 33751, 34174, 34389, 34568 and 32703 of 2019, order of 7 September 2020. It converts a date arithmetic point into a complete answer on a transfer pricing addition, without touching the merits of the benchmarking. The reasoning is that the sixty days exist to leave the AO time to frame the draft order, so compressing them defeats the scheme of s.92CA read with ss.144C and 153. Do the date check on every transfer pricing assessment before drafting anything on comparables. Note the date: as at 8 September 2026 the arithmetic itself has been overtaken by s.92CA(3AA) for 31 March and 31 December expiries, but the mandatory character of the sixty days — which is what makes the check worth doing at all — is untouched by that amendment. If it applies to you, the first step is this: Work out the s.153 date for the year, then take the count from the right source: if that date is 31 March or 31 December, s.92CA(3AA) now fixes the last permissible date (30 January, 31 January in a leap year, or 1 November respectively); on any other date, including the 30 September expiry that is ordinary for AY 2018-19 onwards, count sixty days back excluding the limitation date as this judgment directs. Compare the result with the date the TPO's order was actually passed.
This was a batch of writ petitions by several assessees, of which Pfizer Healthcare India was petitioner in W.P. Nos. 32699 and 32703 of 2019. For assessment year 2016-17 the returns included income from transactions with associated entities abroad, so references were made to the Transfer Pricing Officer, who passed orders under s.92CA(3) on 1 November 2019. The period for completing the assessment under s.153(1) was 21 months from the end of the assessment year, expiring on 31 December 2019. Section 92CA(3A) requires the transfer pricing order to be made 'at any time before sixty days prior to' the date on which that limitation expires. The petitioners said the orders were out of time by a single day; the revenue said limitation expired at 12 a.m. on 1 January 2020, so that sixty days back was 2 November 2019 and an order of 1 November was in time. Some petitioners also alleged breach of natural justice because the Transfer Pricing Officer's notices issued close to the limitation date. A separate ground taken by the revenue was that the sixty-day period was directory only. The matter was decided on 2020-09-07 by the High Court (Madras High Court — single judge, Anita Sumanth J; affirmed by a Division Bench of the Madras High Court in writ appeal). On those facts the High Court held as follows. The writ petitions were held maintainable notwithstanding the alternative remedy before the Dispute Resolution Panel, limitation being a question with no factual dispute (para 21). The sixty-day period in s.92CA(3A) was held not to be directory or a rough guideline; s.144C prescribes mandatory time limits before and after the transfer pricing order and the legislative intention is to fast-track such assessments (para 29). On computation, the period of 21 months expires on 31 December 2019 and that date must itself be excluded, because s.92CA(3A) speaks of an order 'before 60 days prior to' the date on which the s.153 limitation expires; excluding 31 December 2019, the sixty days expire on 1 November 2019, so the transfer pricing orders had to be passed on 31 October 2019 or earlier (para 30). The orders of 1 November 2019 were therefore barred by limitation. The writ petitions were allowed and the impugned orders quashed, except two - W.P. No. 35420 of 2019 (Verizon Data Services India) and W.P. No. 35272 of 2019 (TVS Motor Company), where the petitioners had already taken statutory remedies and their petitions were closed to let them pursue those (para 32).
The Court began from the structure of the Act: limitation is prescribed at every stage of an assessment involving transfer pricing - the return, the transfer pricing proceedings, objections under s.144C(2), the final order under s.144C(4), directions of the Dispute Resolution Panel under s.144C(12) and the final order under s.144C(13) - so such an assessment is measured by limitation at every step (para 22). It then reviewed the authorities on 'may' and 'shall', which establish that the word used is not decisive and that the scheme, object and consequences govern (paras 23 to 28). Applying that, it held the sixty-day period mandatory: transfer pricing assessments are a distinct, specialised and deliberately fast-tracked stream with a dedicated set of officers and a panel constituted for timely dispute resolution, and in that scheme the sixty days cannot be a guideline (para 29). On the arithmetic, the Court reasoned that an assessment must be complete before 11.59.59 p.m. on 31 December 2019, so the 21 months expire on that day; and because s.92CA(3A) requires the order 'before 60 days prior to' that date, 31 December itself is excluded from the count. Counting back sixty days from that exclusion brings the period to an end on 1 November 2019, so the order had to be passed on 31 October 2019 or before. The Court noted that the Board's own Central Action Plan gave 31 October 2019 as the date by which transfer pricing audits time-barred that year were to be completed (para 30). It rejected the revenue's reliance on s.92CA(4) and on the argument that the sixty days served only the internal convenience of officers. In the words reproduced by the source cited on this page: "The period of 21 months therefore, expires on 31-12-2019 that must stand excluded since section 92CA(3A) states 'before 60 days prior to the date on which the period of limitation referred to section 153 expires'. Excluding 31-12-2019, the period of 60 days would expire on 1-11-2019 and the transfer pricing orders thus ought to have been passed on 31-10-2019 or any date prior thereto."
It was decided by the High Court on 2020-09-07 and is reported as [2021] 124 taxmann.com 536 (Madras) / (2021) 433 ITR 28 (Madras); W.P. Nos. 32699, 33751, 34174, 34389, 34568 and 32703 of 2019, order of 7 September 2020. Binding within that High Court's jurisdiction. Persuasive elsewhere. A High Court decision binds the assessing officer, the Commissioner (Appeals) and the Income Tax Appellate Tribunal within that state, and is persuasive elsewhere. If your assessment is in a different jurisdiction, check whether your own High Court has taken the same view before relying on it. On section 92CA, section 92CA(3A), section 92CA(4), section 153, section 153(1), section 144C, 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 helps the taxpayer. The writ petitions were held maintainable notwithstanding the alternative remedy before the Dispute Resolution Panel, limitation being a question with no factual dispute (para 21). The sixty-day period in s.92CA(3A) was held not to be directory or a rough guideline; s.144C prescribes mandatory time limits before and after the transfer pricing order and the legislative intention is to fast-track such assessments (para 29). On computation, the period of 21 months expires on 31 December 2019 and that date must itself be excluded, because s.92CA(3A) speaks of an order 'before 60 days prior to' the date on which the s.153 limitation expires; excluding 31 December 2019, the sixty days expire on 1 November 2019, so the transfer pricing orders had to be passed on 31 October 2019 or earlier (para 30). The orders of 1 November 2019 were therefore barred by limitation. The writ petitions were allowed and the impugned orders quashed, except two - W.P. No. 35420 of 2019 (Verizon Data Services India) and W.P. No. 35272 of 2019 (TVS Motor Company), where the petitioners had already taken statutory remedies and their petitions were closed to let them pursue those (para 32). It arises in Assessment & Scrutiny and How Tax Law Is Read matters, on section 92CA, section 92CA(3A), section 92CA(4), section 153, section 153(1), section 144C of the Income Tax Act 1961, and was decided by Madras High Court — single judge, Anita Sumanth J; affirmed by a Division Bench of the Madras High Court in writ appeal. 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. Check the position as at the date you file: s.92CA(3AA) was inserted retrospectively from 1 June 2007 by the Finance Act 2026, and the Revenue Bar Association's challenge to the Finance Act 2026 retrospective amendments was pending in the Madras High Court on 8 September 2026, notice having issued on 15 June 2026. Verify the date the TPO's order was passed from the order itself rather than from the date of its service. Take the point by writ where the assessment is still in progress, since the court quashed the order rather than remitting it. Do not abandon the merits grounds; the limitation point depends entirely on the dates holding up.
Superseded by amendment. Superseded on the arithmetic by retrospective statute; the rest of the decision stands. Section 92CA(3AA) was inserted by the Finance Act, 2026 (Act No. 4 of 2026, assented to on 30 March 2026), section 4 of which directs that after sub-section (3A) the new sub-section "shall be inserted and shall be deemed to have been inserted with effect from the 1st day of June, 2007". It reads: "Notwithstanding anything contained in any judgment, order or decree of any court, for the purposes of making order under sub-section (3), the calculation of sixty days shall be made and shall always be deemed to have been made in the following manner, namely:— (a) where the period of limitation expires on 31st of March of any year (not being a leap year), the order under sub-section (3) may be made up to the 30th of January of that year; (b) where the period of limitation expires on 31st of March of any year (being a leap year), the order under sub-section (3) may be made up to the 31st of January of that year; (c) where the period of limitation expires on 31st of December of any year, the order under sub-section (3) may be made up to the 1st of November of that year." Read on three sources on 8 September 2026: the enacted Act at incometaxindia.gov.in/documents/d/guest/finance-act-2026-pdf-1 (section 4); the Bill as introduced, BILL No. 3 OF 2026 at indiabudget.gov.in/doc/Finance_Bill.pdf, clause 4, in identical words; and the departmental section page incometaxindia.gov.in/w/section-92ca-26, stamped "Year: 2026", where the sub-section is printed in the body and footnote 11 reads "Ins. by Act No. 4 of 2026, w.r.e.f. 1-6-2007." What it does to the counting: in each case it covers, it gives the Transfer Pricing Officer exactly one day more than this judgment allowed. This Court held that the limitation date is excluded and the sixty days counted back from it, so that on a 31 December 2019 expiry the transfer pricing order had to be passed on 31 October 2019 or earlier; clause (c) now permits an order up to 1 November 2019, which is the very date these orders bore. The same one-day shift applies to a 31 March expiry, where the counting in this judgment yields 29 January (non-leap) and 30 January (leap) and clauses (a) and (b) give 30 and 31 January. The Gujarat High Court has applied the new sub-section in that way in Principal Commissioner of Income Tax (Central), Ahmedabad v Zydus Lifesciences Ltd, R/Tax Appeal No. 69 of 2025, decided 13 August 2026 by Bhargav D. Karia and Pranav Trivedi JJ, holding a TPO order of 1 November 2019 that the Tribunal had treated as time-barred to be within limitation under (3AA), setting the Tribunal's order aside and remitting the matter to be considered on merits. Two limits on the amendment, and they matter. First, (3AA) legislates for two expiry dates only — 31 March, leap and non-leap, and 31 December. It is silent on a 30 September expiry, which is the ordinary s.153(1) date for AY 2018-19 onwards, and silent on every other date. For those years the sub-section supplies no rule at all and the construction in this judgment — exclude the date on which the s.153 period expires, then count the sixty days back from it — continues to govern. Second, (3AA) is confined by its own words to "the calculation of sixty days". It does not touch the other and more often cited holding of this batch, that the sixty-day period in s.92CA(3A) is mandatory and not directory or a rough guideline, that "may" in that sub-section means "shall", and that an order made outside it is without jurisdiction and non est. That holding is unaffected and remains binding. The affirmance history is unaffected. The same judge records in Pfizer Healthcare India (P.) Ltd. v. Dy. CIT [2023] 151 taxmann.com 200 / (2023) 452 ITR 187 (Madras), decided 11 November 2022, that the conclusion reached in this batch — "W.P. Nos. 32699 of 2019 etc. and batch" — "stands affirmed by the Division Bench in Dy. CIT v. Saint Gobain India (P.) Ltd. [2022] 137 taxmann.com 215/444 ITR 636 (Mad.)", decided 31 March 2022; Saint Gobain India was itself one of the petitioners in this batch, in W.P. No. 33751 of 2019. No SLP, stay or reversal appears on the report of either decision. A challenge to the amendment is pending. The Revenue Bar Association has moved the Madras High Court against the retrospective amendments made by the Finance Act 2026, and a Division Bench of Chief Justice S.A. Dharmadhikari and Arul Murugan J issued notice to the Union and the Income-tax Department on 15 June 2026, directing a response within four weeks with a rejoinder two weeks thereafter and listing the matter for 21 July 2026. Bar and Bench's report of 15 June 2026 records the notice and the ground — that the amendments "retrospectively nullify High Court rulings without removing their legal basis" — but does not name the provisions challenged. The India Legal report of the same notice does name s.92CA(3AA) among them, along with ss.144C, 153 and 153B, ss.147 and 147A, and s.292BA. Neither the petition nor the order sheet was read, so the inclusion of s.92CA(3AA) in the challenge is recorded as reported in the press and not confirmed from the court record, and the outcome is unknown as at 8 September 2026. 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.
Cite this as a batch order: W.P. Nos. 32699, 33751, 34174, 34389, 34568 and 32703 of 2019, decided 7 September 2020 by Dr. Anita Sumanth, J., reported at [2021] 124 taxmann.com 536 / (2021) 433 ITR 28 (Madras). Pfizer was petitioner in W.P. Nos. 32699 and 32703; Saint Gobain India, in W.P. No. 33751, was another petitioner in the same batch, which is why the Division Bench affirmance is reported under Saint Gobain's name at [2022] 137 taxmann.com 215 / 444 ITR 636 (Mad.), decided 31 March 2022. The writ appeal numbers previously carried in this entry (W.A. Nos. 1148 and 1149 of 2021) could not be confirmed from the report and should not be cited without checking. Two limits on the order: two petitioners who had already invoked statutory remedies were left to pursue them and their petitions were closed rather than allowed (para 32), and the alternative ground of breach of natural justice was not separately decided. The subscription database tags this decision 'in favour of revenue'; that is a cataloguing slip - para 32 allows the petitions and quashes the transfer pricing orders. The judgment does not state the quantum of the transfer pricing adjustments, and does not decide the alternative natural justice ground raised in some of the petitions. 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.
The writ petitions were held maintainable notwithstanding the alternative remedy before the Dispute Resolution Panel, limitation being a question with no factual dispute (para 21). The sixty-day period in s.92CA(3A) was held not to be directory or a rough guideline; s.144C prescribes mandatory time limits before and after the transfer pricing order and the legislative intention is to fast-track such assessments (para 29). On computation, the period of 21 months expires on 31 December 2019 and that date must itself be excluded, because s.92CA(3A) speaks of an order 'before 60 days prior to' the date on which the s.153 limitation expires; excluding 31 December 2019, the sixty days expire on 1 November 2019, so the transfer pricing orders had to be passed on 31 October 2019 or earlier (para 30). The orders of 1 November 2019 were therefore barred by limitation. The writ petitions were allowed and the impugned orders quashed, except two - W.P. No. 35420 of 2019 (Verizon Data Services India) and W.P. No. 35272 of 2019 (TVS Motor Company), where the petitioners had already taken statutory remedies and their petitions were closed to let them pursue those (para 32).
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