On Monday, the Congress party filed a case in the Delhi High Court challenging a recent ruling by the Income Tax Appellate Tribunal (ITAT) that rejected its appeal against the application of penalties for errors in certain tax forms.
In front of a two-judge bench, senior advocate Vivek Tankha brought up the issue, stating that it was urgent because the Grand Old Party's finances were stopped.
"There is a little urgency to this. The Indian National Congress filed this petition in opposition to the ITAT order that frozen our accounts. We are currently pursuing an appeal, and we also filed a stay motion," Tankha was quoted as saying by LiveLaw.
The Congress' appeal against the imposition of penalties of Rs 210 crore was denied by the ITAT last month. In the run-up to the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, the BJP called the I-T tribunal order "an attack on democracy" at the time.
The IT Department then started the process of recovering the money by taking out more than Rs 65 crore from the Congress' bank accounts. Due to two primary infractions, the ITAT ordered last month that the Congress party's bank accounts be frozen.
The first was the violation of Section 13 A requirements of the Income Tax Act for FY 2018–19 by failing to file the income tax return within the allotted time frame under Section 139(4B).
The second was accepting extravagant 2,000 cash gifts, making a total of Rs 14.49 lakh after receiving Rs 3 lakh through the real-time gross settlement (RTGS) mechanism. Additionally, it claimed that the Congress party had made no attempts to make amends for its purportedly intentional payment default.
It has been four years since the income tax payment was due, and the party has not demonstrated any willingness to pay the outstanding amount. The Congress attributed the Income Tax Return filing delay at the time to deadline extensions in election years.
The party further stated that the Rs 11.49 lakh that 23 MLAs and MPs gave them could not be considered "donations". The Congress added that they had been unfairly singled out to prevent them from running in the general elections in 2024.
