- (1.) The short facts leading to this appeal are as follows: The respondent-assessee was assessed to sales tax by the Assessment Officer. After some time, he invoked the suo motu powers of the Deputy Commissioner under Section 32 of the Tamil Nadu General Sales Tax Act (for short "the Act") questioning the correctness of the assessment. The Deputy Commissioner dismissed the petition in limine. The assessee filed a writ petition challenging the said order in the High Court. The High Court held that the Deputy Commissioner should entertain the revision and decide it on its merits. The matter was thus remanded.
(2.) After remand, the Deputy Commissioner once again dismissed the petition on merits. The assessee filed an appeal to the Tribunal which went into the merits and found that the assessee's contention was correct. Consequently, the appeal was allowed. The said judgment of the Tribunal was challenged by the appellant in revision under the Act.
(3.) In the revision petition, following three contentions were urged: (1) that the time limit of four years for exercising the suo motu powers of the Deputy Commissioner under Section 32 had expired by the time he passed his order on 19th February, 1968, and the order of assessment could not be revised at that stage; (2) that the assessee not having filed an appeal against the order of assessment could not invoke the revisional jurisdiction of the Deputy Commissioner; and (3) that as the exemption of the sales from tax was already available under the law and the assessee having shown the amount of turnover in its return and got the same assessed without protest could not later contest the liability and invoke the jurisdiction under Section 32. All the three contentions were rejected by the High Court and the appellant is before us in this appeal.;