Section 92CA(3)

Section 92CA(3) — the law in short

What the courts have decided on section 92CA(3), in one screen. Read this first; open an entry when you need the facts, the reasoning and the source.

• Benteler Automotive India Pvt Ltd v Union of India High CourtHelps taxpayerNo later treatment found
  The DRP issued its directions years ago and the Assessing Officer has still not passed a final assessment order. Is the assessment now dead, or can he pass one whenever he likes?
  It is dead. Section 144C(13) requires the Assessing Officer, on receipt of the DRP's directions under s.144C(5), to complete the assessment in conformity with them within one month from the end of the month in which the directions are received, and he need not give any further hearing. Where that month passed — here even after the extension of the outer date under the Taxation and Other Laws (Relaxation and Amendment of Certain Provisions) Act 2020 — and no order was passed, the Bombay High Court held the assessment barred by limitation and quashed the pending proceedings on the assessee's writ petition.
• Xiaomi Technology India Private Limited v DCIT High CourtHelps taxpayer
  The Assessing Officer has provisionally attached our deposits under s.281B saying a large demand is likely. Is an expected demand enough?
  No. A mere apprehension that huge tax demands are likely to be raised on completion of assessment is not enough. The officer must record his own formation of opinion, on tangible material, that the assessee is likely to defeat the demand and that attachment is necessary - not merely expedient - to protect the revenue, and the attachment must be proportionate. An order resting on the Investigation Wing's and the Transfer Pricing Officer's findings is borrowed satisfaction, and the Principal Commissioner's approval is not an empty formality.
• Times Global Broadcasting Company Ltd v Union of India High CourtHelps taxpayerSuperseded by amendment
  The TPO has adjusted a domestic transaction that the Assessing Officer never referred to him and that I never reported in Form 3CEB. Did he have jurisdiction?
  On the law as it stood, no. The Bombay High Court held that s.92CA(2A) and s.92CA(2B), which let the TPO take up a transaction not referred to him and a transaction not reported under s.92E, spoke only of international transactions; specified domestic transactions were conspicuously absent. For a specified domestic transaction the TPO could therefore study only what the Assessing Officer had referred, and the adjustment of Rs 57.54 crores on the demerger creditors was quashed. CAUTION: that gap has since been closed. Both sub-sections were amended by Act No. 15 of 2024 with effect from 1 April 2025 to cover specified domestic transactions as well.
• Indorama Synthetics (India) Ltd v Additional CIT High CourtHelps taxpayerHigh Courts differ
  The Assessing Officer referred my case to the TPO in a one-paragraph letter without dealing with my objection that there was no international transaction at all. Can I attack the reference itself?
  Yes. The Delhi High Court held that the Assessing Officer's satisfaction, even prima facie, that there IS an international transaction or specified domestic transaction is a sine qua non for a reference under s.92CA(1); where the assessee raises a threshold objection to jurisdiction, the officer must deal with it and must give a hearing before recording his satisfaction. The three references were set aside and the officer directed to decide afresh after hearing the assessee. The Court concurred with the Bombay High Court in Vodafone India Services and declined to follow the contrary Gujarat decision in Veer Gems, noting that CBDT Instruction No. 3 of 2016 has itself adopted the Bombay position.
• Shell India Markets P Ltd v ACIT High CourtHelps taxpayerNo later treatment found
  The TPO says we issued shares to our parent too cheaply. Can he tax the shortfall?
  No. The issue of equity to a non-resident parent is on capital account and gives rise to no income, and Chapter X is machinery for computing income at arm's length, not a charge. With no income there is nothing for the transfer pricing machinery to work on, and re-characterising the alleged shortfall as an interest-bearing loan has no statutory foundation.
• Li & Fung India Pvt Ltd v CIT High CourtHelps taxpayer
  I run a captive sourcing arm paid cost plus 5 per cent. The TPO has ignored my cost base and applied a mark-up to the FOB value of the goods my group company sources through me. Can he do that?
  No. The Delhi High Court held that broad-basing the profit determining denominator to the entire free-on-board value of contracts entered into by the associated enterprise is contrary to the Act and the Rules. The exercise finds no mention in either. The Transfer Pricing Officer had not disturbed the comparables or the method, and had shown neither how the Indian company bore significant risk nor what locational advantage the associated enterprise enjoyed. Findings of "significant risk" and "functional risk" cannot rest on vague generalities. The addition of Rs.57.65 crore was deleted and the Tribunal's order set aside.
• Tech Mahindra Ltd v DCIT — two independent answers to a secondary adjustment: the assessment year commenced before 1 April 2016, so the first proviso to s.92CE(1) shuts the section out; and there was no surviving primary adjustment for a consequential adjustment to attach to ITATHelps taxpayerNo later treatment found
  The TPO has re-characterised a payment to my associated enterprise as an interest-free loan and imputed notional interest on it, calling it a consequential adjustment. My year is well before 2016 and the underlying adjustment was itself deleted. Can he do that?
  No, on either of two grounds, and the ITAT Mumbai gave both on 24 August 2026 for assessment year 2008-09. First, there was nothing left for the imputed interest to attach to: the primary adjustment of Rs 440.12 crores on the exclusivity payment "was not ultimately made in the final assessment, pursuant to the directions of the Ld. DRP and after verification by the Ld.AO", and "Consequently, there was no surviving primary adjustment to which a consequential adjustment on account of notional interest could attach". Second, and independently, the year was out of range: "A.Y. 2008-09 is an assessment year commencing prior to 01/04/2016. Consequently, in view of proviso (ii) to section 92CE(1) of the Act, the provisions relating to secondary adjustment were not applicable to the transaction under consideration." The Tribunal deleted the notional-interest adjustment of Rs 72.34 lakhs on the exclusivity payment and the adjustment of Rs 69.82 crores on the upfront discount of Rs 524.93 crores carried forward from assessment year 2007-08, and applied the same reasoning mutatis mutandis to the transition fee. The appeal was partly allowed.
• ACIT v Transworld Garnet India Private Limited ITATHelps taxpayerNo later treatment found
  The officer took the TPO's adjustment straight into a final order without giving me a draft order. The department says s.292B cures it. Does it?
  It does not, on this line of authority. The Tribunal held that once the assessee answers the description of an 'eligible assessee' under s.144C(15)(b) and a variation prejudicial to it is proposed, s.144C(1) is mandatory, and passing the final order without first forwarding a draft is a failure of a jurisdictional condition precedent, not a procedural lapse. Section 292B cures only technical or clerical defects in proceedings otherwise validly initiated and cannot confer a jurisdiction that was never lawfully assumed. The Revenue's alternative plea for a remand to let the officer start again was also rejected: a nullity cannot be revived by remand.
• DCIT v Kantar GDC India Private Limited ITATHelps departmentNo later treatment found
  The TPO is charging notional interest on my overdue receivables from my associated enterprise. Can I argue for a 90-day credit period by analogy to the secondary adjustment repatriation window in s.92CE and Rule 10CB?
  No, on this Tribunal's view. Section 92CE read with Rule 10CB operates only where a primary adjustment has been made in one of the specific situations the section lists, and the 90-day repatriation window attaches to that specific machinery; it cannot be borrowed as a general benchmark for the credit period allowable on outstanding receivables. The Tribunal instead directed the officer to adopt the credit period the TPO himself had adopted in the assessee's own case for the immediately preceding year that had reached the Tribunal.
• ACIT v Citigroup Global Markets India Pvt Ltd ITATCuts both waysNo later treatment found
  The CIT(A) held my TPO order time barred because it was digitally signed a day after the date printed on it. The Revenue is now relying on a new sub-section. Where does that leave me?
  The Tribunal applied clause (c) of s.92CA(3AA) — then still the proposed clause 4 of the Finance Bill 2026, enacted three days after the order was pronounced — and held the TPO's order within time. The order was dated 31 October 2019 but digitally signed and issued on 1 November 2019, and the CIT(A) had annulled the transfer pricing adjustment on the footing that a 31 December 2019 assessment deadline required the TPO's order by 31 October. Because s.92CA(3AA)(c) deems that where limitation expires on 31 December the order may be made up to 1 November, the Tribunal allowed the Revenue's grounds on limitation and remanded the merits of the adjustment to the CIT(A), who had never decided them.
• SP Imperial Star Private Limited v National Faceless Assessment Centre ITATCuts both waysUnder appeal
  The Transfer Pricing Officer has treated all the lenders named in my Form 3CEB as associated enterprises and applied section 94B to the whole interest. Can I still show that two of them are not associated enterprises?
  Yes. The Tribunal held that the first and foremost criterion for invoking section 94B is to identify whether the enterprise is an associated enterprise or a deemed associated enterprise, and that question must be settled before any arm's length or thin capitalisation computation is made. It remanded the matter for the disallowance to be recomputed on the basis of the revised Form 3CEB, holding that the statute prescribes no time limit for filing that form.
• Mando Automotive India Pvt Ltd v ACIT ITATCuts both waysNo later treatment found
  Your MAP resolution settles the transactions with the treaty-country associated enterprise. Can the same treatment be claimed for your associated enterprises in other countries?
  Not automatically, but the claim is arguable and the Tribunal will not shut it out. The Chennai Bench restored the adjustment on the transactions with the non-Korean associated enterprises to the Transfer Pricing Officer to examine whether they are similar in nature to those covered by the India-Korea MAP resolution, and, if they are found to be so, to consider giving them the same treatment as adopted in the MAP. The relief is a remand on a similarity test, not a direction to apply the agreed margin.
• Mondelez India Foods P. Ltd v Addl CIT ITATHelps taxpayerSuperseded by amendment
  The TPO's order is dated one day inside the sixty-day window as I count it, but the department counts it differently. Is the order time barred, and if it is, does the assessment fall with it?
  On the counting the Tribunal applied Pfizer Healthcare and the Madras High Court Division Bench in DCIT v Saint Gobain India: the s.153 expiry date is EXCLUDED, sixty days are counted back from it, and the TPO must pass his order BEFORE the sixtieth day. On that arithmetic a 31 March 2014 assessment deadline meant a TPO order by 29 January 2014, and the order of 30 January 2014 was barred by one day. THAT ARITHMETIC HAS SINCE BEEN REVERSED RETROSPECTIVELY: s.92CA(3AA), inserted by the Finance Act 2026 (Act 4 of 2026) with effect from 1 June 2007 and expressly notwithstanding any judgment of any court, deems the sixty days to be counted so that a 31 March (non-leap year) deadline permits a TPO order up to 30 January, a 31 March (leap year) deadline up to 31 January, and a 31 December deadline up to 1 November. The second holding survives the amendment: where the TPO's order IS invalid, there is no order under s.92CA(3), so there is no 'eligible assessee' within s.144C(15)(b), no reference to the DRP could be made, and the subsequent proceedings are without jurisdiction.
• Faith Intertrade v ITO ITATHelps taxpayer
  I obtained Form 3CEB from my accountant but never uploaded it, and the officer has levied the flat Rs 1 lakh penalty under s.271BA. Is that penalty automatic?
  It is not automatic. Section 271BA says the officer 'may' direct payment of the penalty, not 'shall', and s.273B forbids the penalty where the assessee proves reasonable cause. The Tribunal quashed a Rs 1,00,000 penalty on an assessee who had obtained the accountant's report dated 7 September 2013 but failed to upload it electronically, in the first year in which specified domestic transactions were brought within s.92E, where the TPO had made no adjustment at all.
• ACIT v Dilipkumar V. Lakhi ITATHelps taxpayerNo later treatment found
  The TPO wants segment-wise profit and loss accounts for my AE and non-AE business and I cannot produce them. He has levied 2 per cent of the transaction value under s.271G. Can I resist it?
  Yes, where the failure is backed by a reasonable cause, because s.273B applies to s.271G. The Tribunal upheld the deletion of a Rs 56,72,162 penalty on a diamond trader who had furnished entity-level margins but could not split AE from non-AE segments, holding that in a trade where rough and polished diamonds move in mixed lots it is practically impossible to trace which rough stone became which polished stone, and that the assessee had substantially complied to the extent the trade allowed.
• Statutory position — s.144C(15)(b): who is an "eligible assessee", the two limbs, and the substitution by Act No. 12 of 2020 with effect from 1 April 2020 that brought in every non-resident not being a company CBDT Circulars & InstructionsCuts both ways
  The Assessing Officer has forwarded a draft order to our partnership firm, which is non-resident but is not a company, and there is no Transfer Pricing Officer's order in the case. Is the firm an eligible assessee at all, and does it matter which assessment year we are in?
  It matters a great deal which year you are in. As s.144C(15)(b) stands on the departmental edition stamped Year 2025 it reads: "(b) 'eligible assessee' means,— (i) any person in whose case the variation referred to in sub-section (1) arises as a consequence of the order of the Transfer Pricing Officer passed under sub-section (3) of section 92CA; and (ii) any non-resident not being a company, or any foreign company:". Sub-clause (ii) in that form was substituted by Act No. 12 of 2020 with effect from 1 April 2020 — footnote 97 on the departmental edition stamped Year 2021 reads verbatim "Sub. by the Act No. 12 of 2020, w.e.f. 1-4-2020.", and footnote 91 on the Year 2022 edition repeats it. Before that substitution, and as printed on the editions stamped Year 2009 and Year 2019 (No. 2), sub-clause (ii) read simply "any foreign company". So a non-resident firm, a non-resident individual, a non-resident association of persons — any non-resident that is not a company — became an eligible assessee in its own right on 1 April 2020 and was not one before, unless it was brought in by limb (i). Limb (i) is independent of status: it catches ANY person, resident or not, company or not, where the variation in sub-section (1) arises as a consequence of an order of the Transfer Pricing Officer under s.92CA(3). Two things were added with effect from 1 September 2024 by Act No. 15 of 2024: a proviso to clause (b) reading "Provided that such eligible assessee shall not include person referred to in sub-section (1) of section 158BA or other person referred to in section 158BD.", and s.144C(16), "The provisions of this section shall not apply to any proceedings under Chapter XIV-B."
• Statutory position — rule 10CA: the dataset, the arm's length range from the thirty-fifth to the sixty-fifth percentile where there are six or more entries, the median where the price falls outside it, and the arithmetical mean under sub-rule (7) where there are fewer than six CBDT Circulars & InstructionsCuts both ways
  The Transfer Pricing Officer has rejected our margin and adopted the median of his comparables. When is he entitled to go to the median at all, how is the range built, and what happens if he is left with only four or five comparables?
  The range is built only where the dataset has six or more entries and the most appropriate method is not the profit split method or the other method. Rule 10CA(2) requires a dataset constructed by placing the prices in ascending order. Rule 10CA(4) then provides that where the most appropriate method applied is a method other than the method referred to in clause (d) or clause (f) of s.92C(1) and the dataset consists of six or more entries, "an arm's length range beginning from the thirty-fifth percentile of the dataset and ending on the sixty-fifth percentile of the dataset shall be constructed". Rule 10CA(5): if the price actually charged is within that range it "shall be deemed to be the arm's length price" — no adjustment. Rule 10CA(6): if it is outside the range, "the arm's length price shall be taken to be the median of the dataset". The median is therefore reached only on the footing that the range was properly constructed and the price fell outside it; there is no route to the median in a case where sub-rule (4) never applied. Where sub-rule (4) does not apply — fewer than six entries, or the profit split method or the other method — sub-rule (7) revives the older machinery: the arm's length price is the arithmetical mean of all the values in the dataset, subject to the proviso that if the variation does not exceed such percentage not exceeding three per cent as may be notified, the price actually charged is deemed to be the arm's length price. The thirty-fifth percentile, the sixty-fifth percentile and the median are all defined in sub-rule (8) on the same pattern, and the pattern is not the ordinary statistical one: each is the LOWEST value in the ascending dataset such that at least thirty-five, sixty-five or fifty per cent of the values are equal to or less than that value, with a proviso that if the number of values equal to or less than that value is a whole number, the percentile is the arithmetic mean of that value and the value immediately succeeding it.
• Statutory position — rule 10B(1)(e) and rule 10B(3): how the transactional net margin method is applied, and the second limb of rule 10B(3) under which reasonably accurate adjustments to eliminate the material effects of differences are the statutory basis for working capital and risk adjustments CBDT Circulars & InstructionsCuts both ways
  The Transfer Pricing Officer has refused our working capital adjustment on the ground that no rule provides for it. Where in the Rules does the right to a working capital or risk adjustment come from, and does anything prescribe how it is computed?
  The right comes from rule 10B(3)(ii), read with rule 10B(1)(e)(iii); nothing in the Rules prescribes how either adjustment is computed. Rule 10B(3) is in two limbs and the word between them is "or": an uncontrolled transaction is comparable to an international transaction or a specified domestic transaction if "(i) none of the differences, if any, between the transactions being compared, or between the enterprises entering into such transactions are likely to materially affect the price or cost charged or paid in, or the profit arising from, such transactions in the open market; or (ii) reasonably accurate adjustments can be made to eliminate the material effects of such differences." So a comparable is not disqualified by a material difference. It is disqualified only if the difference is material AND no reasonably accurate adjustment can be made for it. That second limb is the statutory basis for the working capital adjustment and the risk adjustment, and an officer who refuses an adjustment must, to be consistent, either say the difference is not material — in which case limb (i) is satisfied and the comparable stands unadjusted — or say the adjustment proposed is not reasonably accurate, which is a question of the assessee's computation and not of the existence of the power. Rule 10B(1)(e) carries the same idea inside the transactional net margin method itself: sub-clause (iii) requires that the net profit margin arising in comparable uncontrolled transactions "is adjusted to take into account the differences, if any, between the international transaction or the specified domestic transaction and the comparable uncontrolled transactions, or between the enterprises entering into such transactions, which could materially affect the amount of net profit margin in the open market". On the words of sub-clause (iii) the adjustment is mandatory, not discretionary. What the Rules do not do is prescribe a method. Rule 10B, rule 10C and rule 10CA have all been read in full and none of them prescribes a formula, a base or a rate for computing a working capital adjustment or a risk adjustment.
• Statutory position — rule 10B(3): the Income-tax Rules expressly contemplate a comparability adjustment and prescribe NO method for computing one — a proved negative across rules 10A, 10AB, 10B, 10C, 10CA, 10D and 10TA and s.92F, with nothing in any CBDT circular, instruction or departmental transfer pricing page either CBDT Circulars & InstructionsCuts both ways
  The Transfer Pricing Officer has thrown out my working capital adjustment saying there is no prescribed method for it. Is he right that there is no prescribed method, and if he is, what does that do to the claim?
  He is right on the first half and wrong on the second. No provision of the Income-tax Rules, 1962 prescribes a formula, a base, a period, a source of interest rates or any other method for computing a working capital adjustment or a risk adjustment. Rules 10A, 10AB, 10B, 10C, 10CA, 10D and 10TA have each been read in full, and s.92F, and none of them does. But the absence of a method is not the absence of a power. Rule 10B(3) reads: "An uncontrolled transaction shall be comparable to an international transaction or a specified domestic transaction if— (i) none of the differences, if any, between the transactions being compared, or between the enterprises entering into such transactions are likely to materially affect the price or cost charged or paid in, or the profit arising from, such transactions in the open market; or (ii) reasonably accurate adjustments can be made to eliminate the material effects of such differences." The two limbs are joined by "or", and limb (ii) is an express statutory contemplation of the adjustment. Rule 10B(1)(e)(iii) goes further inside the net margin method itself: the net profit margin arising in comparable uncontrolled transactions "is adjusted to take into account the differences, if any, between the international transaction or the specified domestic transaction and the comparable uncontrolled transactions, or between the enterprises entering into such transactions, which could materially affect the amount of net profit margin in the open market" — the words are "is adjusted", not "may be adjusted". Rule 10C(2)(e) makes "the extent to which reliable and accurate adjustments can be made to account for differences" a statutory factor in selecting the most appropriate method, and rule 10D(1)(j) and (l) require the assessee to keep a record of "adjustments, if any, which were made to account for differences" and "details of the adjustments, if any, made to transfer prices". So the Rules name the adjustment four times over and never once say how to work it out. The expression "reasonably accurate" is not defined anywhere that has been found: not in rule 10A, which is the definitions rule for rules 10A to 10E, and not in s.92F, which is the definitions section for ss.92 to 92E.
• Statutory position — s.92C(2): the second proviso tolerance band, and the third proviso which disapplies the first and second provisos for any international transaction or specified domestic transaction undertaken on or after 1 April 2014 CBDT Circulars & InstructionsCuts both ways
  The Transfer Pricing Officer's adjustment is within three per cent of our price. Can I still claim the tolerance band under the proviso to s.92C(2), or has that gone?
  For a transaction undertaken on or after 1 April 2014 the second proviso does not apply, because the third proviso disapplies it — but the band itself has not gone. It has moved into rule 10CA(7) and it now operates only where the arm's length range machinery does not. The third proviso to s.92C(2) reads: "Provided also that where more than one price is determined by the most appropriate method, the arm's length price in relation to an international transaction or specified domestic transaction undertaken on or after the 1st day of April, 2014, shall be computed in such manner as may be prescribed and accordingly the first and second proviso shall not apply." The first proviso was the arithmetical mean rule; the second was the tolerance band — variation not exceeding such percentage not exceeding three per cent of the transaction price as may be notified, in which case the transaction price is deemed to be the arm's length price. The prescribed manner is rule 10CA. Where rule 10CA(4) applies, six or more entries and a method other than profit split or the other method, the answer is the range and there is no band at all: within the range the price is deemed to be the arm's length price under rule 10CA(5), outside it the arm's length price is the median under rule 10CA(6). Where rule 10CA(4) does not apply, rule 10CA(7) gives the arithmetical mean and carries its own proviso in the same words as the old second proviso, and it is under that proviso, read with the third proviso to s.92C(2), that the band is now notified. The current notification is Notification No. 157/2025 dated 6 November 2025, S.O. 5053(E), issued expressly under "the third proviso to sub-section (2) of section 92C of the Income-tax Act, 1961, read with the proviso to sub-rule (7) of rule 10CA of the Income-tax Rules, 1962", and it fixes the variation at one per cent of the transaction price in respect of wholesale trading and three per cent in all other cases, for assessment year 2025-2026.
• Statutory position — s.144C(1) to (5): the Assessing Officer must, notwithstanding anything to the contrary in the Act, forward a draft order to an eligible assessee before he makes any prejudicial variation, and the assessee has thirty days to accept or to object to the Dispute Resolution Panel AND to the Assessing Officer CBDT Circulars & InstructionsCuts both ways
  The Assessing Officer has served a final assessment order on our foreign company raising a transfer pricing addition, without ever serving a draft order. Was he obliged to serve one first, and what was I supposed to do with it if he had?
  He was obliged to serve one first, if the company is an eligible assessee and the variation is prejudicial. Section 144C(1), as printed on the departmental edition stamped Year 2025, reads: "The Assessing Officer shall, notwithstanding anything to the contrary contained in this Act, in the first instance, forward a draft of the proposed order of assessment (hereafter in this section referred to as the draft order) to the eligible assessee if he proposes to make, on or after the 1st day of October, 2009, any variation which is prejudicial to the interest of such assessee." Three things follow from the words themselves. The obligation is cast in the mandatory "shall"; it operates "notwithstanding anything to the contrary contained in this Act", so it overrides the ordinary assessment machinery; and it bites "in the first instance", that is, before and not after the order that would otherwise be the assessment order. Sub-section (2) gives the eligible assessee thirty days of the receipt by him of the draft order to do one of two things: "(a) file his acceptance of the variations to the Assessing Officer; or (b) file his objections, if any, to such variation with,— (i) the Dispute Resolution Panel; and (ii) the Assessing Officer." The "and" in clause (b) is conjunctive: an objection is filed with the Panel and with the Assessing Officer, not with one or the other. Sub-section (3) requires the officer to complete the assessment on the basis of the draft order if the assessee intimates acceptance of the variation or if no objections are received within the period specified in sub-section (2). Sub-section (4) fixes the time for that order — one month from the end of the month in which the acceptance is received or the period of filing objections expires, notwithstanding s.153 or s.153B. Sub-section (5) is the Panel's charging provision: where any objection is received under sub-section (2), the Panel "shall ... issue such directions, as it thinks fit, for the guidance of the Assessing Officer to enable him to complete the assessment".
• Statutory position — s.144C(2), (4), (5), (12) and (13): the thirty days to object run from receipt, but the officer's one month and the Panel's nine months both run from the END OF THE MONTH, and the two one-month clocks start on different events CBDT Circulars & InstructionsCuts both ways
  We received a draft order on 12 March. Nobody objected. When was the final order due, and if we had objected, by when must the Dispute Resolution Panel have issued its directions and by when must the officer have given effect to them?
  Four clocks, and only one of them runs from a date. Section 144C(2) gives the eligible assessee thirty days "of the receipt by him of the draft order" to file acceptance with the Assessing Officer or objections with the Panel and the Assessing Officer — that one runs from the date of receipt. The other three run from the end of a month, and that is where the counting goes wrong. Section 144C(4): where the assessee accepts or files no objection, "The Assessing Officer shall, notwithstanding anything contained in section 153 or section 153B, pass the assessment order under sub-section (3) within one month from the end of the month in which,— (a) the acceptance is received; or (b) the period of filing of objections under sub-section (2) expires." Section 144C(12): "No direction under sub-section (5) shall be issued after nine months from the end of the month in which the draft order is forwarded to the eligible assessee." Section 144C(13): "Upon receipt of the directions issued under sub-section (5), the Assessing Officer shall, in conformity with the directions, complete, notwithstanding anything to the contrary contained in section 153 or section 153B, the assessment without providing any further opportunity of being heard to the assessee, within one month from the end of the month in which such direction is received." Note the four different starting EVENTS. The thirty days in (2) start on RECEIPT by the assessee. The nine months in (12) start at the end of the month in which the draft order is FORWARDED — the officer's act of despatch, not the assessee's receipt, so the (2) clock and the (12) clock can start in different months on the same draft order. The one month in (4) starts at the end of the month in which the acceptance is received or the thirty-day period expires. The one month in (13) starts at the end of the month in which the DIRECTION is received by the officer. Both (4) and (13) run notwithstanding s.153 and s.153B.
• Statutory position — s.144C(8) with its Explanation, and s.144C(10) and (11): the Panel may confirm, reduce or ENHANCE but may not set aside or remit, the Explanation inserted by the Finance Act 2012 is retrospective to 1 April 2009, the direction binds the Assessing Officer, and no direction may issue without an opportunity of being heard — with what s.253 and s.246A provide about appeal CBDT Circulars & InstructionsCuts both ways
  We are considering objecting to a draft order. Can the Dispute Resolution Panel make our position worse, can it send the matter back for fresh enquiry, and if we lose before it, do we appeal to the Commissioner (Appeals) or straight to the Tribunal?
  It can make your position worse; it cannot send the matter back; and the appeal lies to the Tribunal, not to the Commissioner (Appeals). Section 144C(8), as printed on the departmental edition stamped Year 2025, reads: "The Dispute Resolution Panel may confirm, reduce or enhance the variations proposed in the draft order so, however, that it shall not set aside any proposed variation or issue any direction under sub-section (5) for further enquiry and passing of the assessment order." The Explanation to that sub-section reads: "For the removal of doubts, it is hereby declared that the power of the Dispute Resolution Panel to enhance the variation shall include and shall be deemed always to have included the power to consider any matter arising out of the assessment proceedings relating to the draft order, notwithstanding that such matter was raised or not by the eligible assessee." Footnote 76 on the departmental edition stamped Year 2014 records that Explanation verbatim as "Inserted by the Finance Act, 2012, w.r.e.f. 1-4-2009" — note the date: it is retrospective to 1 April 2009, the date the section itself was inserted from, and not 2012. The original edition stamped Year 2009 prints sub-section (8) with no Explanation at all. Sub-section (10): "Every direction issued by the Dispute Resolution Panel shall be binding on the Assessing Officer." Sub-section (11): "No direction under sub-section (5) shall be issued unless an opportunity of being heard is given to the assessee and the Assessing Officer on such directions which are prejudicial to the interest of the assessee or the interest of the revenue, respectively." Sub-section (9) resolves a difference of opinion among the members by the opinion of the majority. On appeal: s.246A(1)(a), on the departmental edition stamped Year 2025, excepts from the first appeal "an order passed in pursuance of directions of the Dispute Resolution Panel", and s.253(1)(d), on the edition stamped Year 2024 (No. 2), gives a direct right of appeal to the Appellate Tribunal against "an order passed by an Assessing Officer under sub-section (3), of section 143 or section 147 or section 153A or section 153C in pursuance of the directions of the Dispute Resolution Panel or an order passed under section 154 in respect of such order". Sub-sections (2A) and (3A) of s.253 are printed as "[***]" on the current editions, and the departmental edition stamped Year 2016 carries footnotes against both reading "Omtt. by Act No. 28 of 2016 (w.e.f. 1-6-2016)."

Listed strongest first: Supreme Court, then High Court, then Tribunal, then CBDT. Nothing here has yet been read in full by a chartered accountant — open an entry to see where it came from.