SOMNATH IYER, J. - (1.)THESE nine Writ Petitions pose common question which could be disposed of by common judgment. The petitioners are assessees in whose cases assessments were made under the provisions of the Indian Income Tax Act, 1922, which will be referred to as the old Act, and with respect to some of them there was imposition of a penalty also under the old Act. Notices of demand for the payment of the amounts due from them were also issued under Section 29 of that Act and on 'their committing default in the payment of the amounts, certificates were issued in all these cases under Section 222 of the Income Tax Act, 1961, which will be referred to as the new Act for the recovery of the amounts due.
(2.)IT was in this situation that the tax recovery officer commenced proceedings for the recovery of these amounts under Section 222 and we are asked by the petitioners to 'quash the notices of demand issued by him and to forbid the recovery.
Mr. Srinivasan appearing for the petitioners contends that the recovery proceedings commenced by the tax recovery officer were beyond his competence since they were not preceded by notices of demand under Section 156 of the new Act arid also on the further' ground that the certificates forwarded by the concerned Income Tax Officers under Section 222 of the new Act were forwarded beyond the period of limitation prescribed by Section 231 of the new Act. He advanced the further contention that the certificates forwarded in that way by the Income Tax Officer had no efficacy since when they were so forwarded no tax recovery officer had yet been appointed under Section 2(44)(iii) of the new Act.

(3.)IT is undisputed that the assessments made under the old Act were properly made with respect to antecedent periods since Section 297(2)(a) of the new. Act does authorise those assessments. But, it was maintained by Mr. Srinivasan that with respect to the amounts due under these assessments, notices of demand could have been issued only under Section 156 of the new Act and not under Section 29 of the old Act. In support of this postulate, Mr. Srinivasan appealed to the pronouncement of the Supreme Court in Third Income -tax Officer, Mangalore Vs. M. Damodar Bhat, AIR 1969 SC 408 in which the elucidation made was that even with respect to an assessment under the old Act a notice of demand under Section 156 of the new Act could issue. But, that enunciation does not support the proposition that a notice of demand with respect to an assessment made under the old Act could issue only under Section 156, of the new Act and that the notice of demand issued under Section 29 of the old Act is not a good notice.
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