The Madras High Court has issued notice to the union government on a writ petition challenging the constitutional validity of the faceless assessment system under the Income Tax Act.

       The court restrained the tax department from recovering additional demand and posted the matter to November 11.

       The petition challenged the faceless assessment regime as manifestly arbitrary, opaque, contrary to the settled principles of natural justice and administrative law in general and violative of provisions of the equality before law among others in the Constitution.

       Sandeep Sehgal, director-tax and regulatory, AKM global, a tax and consulting firm, stated,"it is to be kept in mind that the intent of the faceless assessment measure was to create a taxpayer friendly system. However, this has been turning out contrary to the same as there have been several instances where the revenue has proceeded ahead without adhering to the principle of natural justice."

       The current petition challenges faceless assessments on related grounds like discretionary personal hearing, opaque risk management strategy, and no statutory basis for automated allocation of cases, he said.