[chanda_s]

to say that assessing officers are junior officers may not be very correct. the assessing officers in inome tax range from an ITO to deputy commissioner who is equivalent to the rank of collector and sp of a district. they are all gazetted officers and those AOs who are assistant or deputy commissioners are employees of the President of India.

the new move should be more reasonable because while you have assessing officers in most district head quarters, commissioners are in select cities of a state. in any case, the information has to be provided by the AOs in most cases. as long as information is provided with least burden to the citizen, this arrangement should work fine and should not be treated as a retrograde step.