The circular is to be found reproduced in volume I of Chaturvedi and Pithisaria's Book, 2nd Edn., at page 532, and the circular runs as follows:
"Officers of the department must not take advantage of the ignorance of an assessee as to his rights. It is one of their duties to assist a taxpayer in every reasonable way, particularly in the matter of claiming and securing reliefs and in this regard the officers should take the initiative in guiding taxpayer where proceedings or other particulars before them indicate that some refund or relief is due to him. This attitude would, in the long run, benefit the department, for, it would inspire confidence in him that he may be sure of getting a square deal from the department. Although, therefore, the responsibility for claiming refunds and reliefs rests with the assessees on whom it is imposed by law, officers should (a) draw their attention to any refunds or reliefs to which they appear to be clearly entitled but which they have omitted to claim for some reason or other;
(b) freely advise them when approached by them as to their rights and liabilities and as to the procedure to be adopted for claiming refunds and reliefs."
This is Circular No. 14 (XI-35) of 1955 and is dated April 11, 1955. In view of this circular it is clear that for the purpose of the circular, what should be the guiding factor is whether the proceedings or other particulars before the ITO at the stage of original assessment disclosed any, grounds for relief under s. 2(5)(a)(iii) of the Finance Act of 1964 or of the Finance Act of 1965, even though no claim was made for that relief by the assessee at the stage of those proceedings before him. It is possible to argue that, to the extent to which the circular of 1955 speaks of proceedings or other, particulars before the ITO as distinguished from the return and the assessment order which were spoken of by the Supreme Court in Rai Bahadur Hardutroy's case [1967] 66 ITR 443, there is a deviation from the correct legal position. But it is now well settled after the decision of the Supreme Court in Ellerman's case [1971] 82 ITR 913, that even if there is a deviation on a point of law, so far as the circular of the Board is concerned, that circular will be binding on all officers concerned with the execution of the I.T. Act and they must carry out their duties in the light of the circular.
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