CLAT PG Current Affairs — 24 October 2026

The Bombay High Court quashed fresh income tax reassessment proceedings initiated against a company that had already undergone resolution under the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code. The court held that once an insolvency resolution plan is approved, the company cannot be reassessed for pre-resolution tax periods, even if the Enforcement Directorate supplies new information. The IBC's moratorium and clean-slate principle shield the resolved company from such proceedings.

This ruling sits at the intersection of two powerful statutes: the Income Tax Act, 1961, and the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2016. The core principle at stake is the 'clean-slate doctrine' embedded in IBC Section 31 — once the National Company Law Tribunal approves a resolution plan, the successful resolution applicant takes over a company free of all prior liabilities not expressly included in the plan. The Supreme Court confirmed this in Ghanashyam Mishra & Sons v. Edelweiss ARC (2021), holding that claims not part of the approved plan are extinguished.

The Income Tax department frequently attempts to reopen assessments under Section 147/148 of the Income Tax Act, arguing that fresh information — here from the ED — constitutes 'reason to believe' income has escaped assessment. The Bombay HC rejected this by affirming that the IBC overrides the Income Tax Act under the non-obstante clause (Section 238 of IBC), which states IBC shall have effect notwithstanding anything inconsistent in any other law.

The moratorium under IBC Section 14 halts all proceedings against the corporate debtor during the resolution process, and the approved plan crystallises this protection permanently for pre-resolution dues. Even a law-enforcement agency's inputs cannot revive tax liability that was extinguished by the NCLT-approved plan. This ruling reinforces the primacy of IBC over sector-specific statutes like the Income Tax Act, a principle the examiner tests repeatedly.

The Karnataka High Court refused to quash an attempted murder charge against an accused who allegedly drove his vehicle deliberately into the complainant. The court held that a motor vehicle, when driven intentionally at a person, can constitute a deadly weapon or instrument of death capable of causing fatal injuries. The charge under Section 307 IPC was therefore sustainable at the trial stage, and the High Court declined to interfere with the framing of the charge.

This ruling turns on the interpretation of Section 307 IPC (attempt to commit murder), now mirrored in Section 109 BNS 2023. For a Section 307 charge to stand, two elements must co-exist: (1) the act must be done with the intention or knowledge that it would cause death, and (2) the act must be of a nature that could, if it caused death, amount to murder. The court does not need proof of actual injury at the charge-framing stage — only a prima facie case.

The key conceptual move here is the treatment of an everyday object — a motor vehicle — as an 'instrument of death.' Indian courts have long recognised that an instrument's ordinary purpose is irrelevant if it is used with lethal intent. A vehicle driven at speed toward a human being satisfies both the mens rea (intention to kill or cause death-likely harm) and the actus reus (an act capable of causing death) requirements under Section 307.

This distinguishes Section 307 from Section 324 (voluntarily causing hurt by dangerous weapons or means) and Section 326 (grievous hurt by dangerous weapons). The difference is not the weapon — it is the intent. Where intent to kill can be inferred from the manner of use, Section 307 applies even if death did not result. Courts have consistently held that the degree of injury caused is not determinative; what matters is what injury would have resulted had the act succeeded fully.

The Supreme Court in Smt. Rano Singh v. Sh. Gurbax Singh held that Article 300A of the Constitution protects every person's right not to be deprived of property except by authority of law. The Court clarified that the State cannot dispossess a person of their property without following due process, and that mere executive action unsupported by a valid law is insufficient. The ruling reinforces that Article 300A is a constitutional right, not merely a statutory entitlement.

Article 300A, inserted by the 44th Constitutional Amendment Act, 1978, provides that no person shall be deprived of his property save by authority of law. Before this amendment, the right to property was a Fundamental Right under Article 19(1)(f) and Article 31. When the 44th Amendment removed it from Part III, the right to property was downgraded to a constitutional right under Part XII but ceased to be enforceable under Article 32 directly.

The Supreme Court has progressively expanded the content of Article 300A through a line of judgments. The Court has held that 'authority of law' means not just the existence of a law, but that the law must be valid, the procedure must be followed, and there must be no arbitrariness. In Vidya Devi v. State of H.P. (2020), the Court held that the State cannot take over land without paying compensation, even for public purposes, if no formal acquisition process is followed.

In the present ruling, the Court reaffirms several key propositions: (1) dispossession without legal sanction violates Article 300A; (2) executive action alone is not 'authority of law'; (3) the right survives even when the property is not acquired through the Land Acquisition Act; and (4) courts can remedy such violations through writ jurisdiction under Article 226, since Article 300A is a constitutional right even if not a fundamental right.

The critical distinction for CLAT PG is that Article 300A cannot be enforced under Article 32 (Supreme Court's writ jurisdiction for fundamental rights) but can be enforced under Article 226 (High Court's broader writ jurisdiction). This procedural nuance is a favourite examiner angle.

The Mumbai Bench of the Income Tax Appellate Tribunal condoned delays of 308 days and 120 days in filing appeals against an assessment order and a penalty order respectively. The taxpayer had missed critical tax notices sent to a registered email address. While accepting that missed digital notices can constitute sufficient cause under the Income Tax Act, the Tribunal imposed a cost of Rs. 5,000 on the taxpayer for negligence in monitoring official communication channels.

This ruling sits at the intersection of procedural law and digital governance in taxation. The core legal question is what constitutes 'sufficient cause' for condoning delay in filing an appeal — a standard drawn from Section 253(5) of the Income Tax Act, 1961, which mirrors the general condonation framework found across Indian procedural law.

The ITAT applied a liberal but not unconditional approach. It accepted that a taxpayer missing emails sent to a registered address can amount to sufficient cause — recognising that digital notices may be overlooked unlike physical service. However, the Tribunal did not grant relief free of cost. By imposing Rs. 5,000, it signalled that careless monitoring of official communication channels is blameworthy even when excusable.

This reflects a broader judicial principle: condonation of delay is not a right but a discretionary remedy. Courts and tribunals balance two competing values — the right of a party to have their dispute heard on merits (access to justice) against the finality of orders and the discipline of limitation periods (legal certainty). The cost mechanism achieves both: delay is condoned, but negligence is penalised.

For CLAT PG, the examiner is likely to extract the principle that 'sufficient cause' is assessed on facts, not mechanically, and that a tribunal may condone delay while simultaneously imposing costs — two things that are not contradictory but complementary within discretionary procedural relief.