POA Specimens explained: this guide covers what it means, who it applies to, the step-by-step process, documents required, fees, due dates and penalties in India — so you can stay compliant with confidence and avoid costly mistakes.
The handbook prints ten POA specimens — four for CIT(A) and ITAT representation by individuals and by companies or firms, one for a spouse during illness, two general powers for family abroad, and three for non-resident property transactions.
The ten POA specimens at a glance
| # | Heading | Purpose |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Special POA | Represent the assessee before CIT(A) — by an individual |
| 2 | Special POA | Represent the assessee before the ITAT — by an individual |
| 3 | Special POA | Represent before CIT(A) — by a company or firm |
| 4 | Special POA | Represent before the ITAT — by a company or firm |
| 5 | Power of Attorney | Represent the husband due to his illness — wife as attorney |
| 6 | General POA | Represent the son pursuing education abroad |
| 7 | General POA | From the spouse working abroad |
| 8 | Special POA | Non-resident, sale of property — authority executed outside India |
| 9 | Special POA | Non-resident, sale of property — authority executed in India |
| 10 | Special POA | Non-resident, sale or letting out of property — executed in India, two attorneys |
The four representation POA specimens
Specimens 1 to 4 share a five-clause skeleton, and it is short enough to lift wholesale into practice:
- To represent the assessee before the named authority for the stated assessment years or appeal number.
- Authorisation to produce any evidence or information required in respect of any proceeding described in clause 1.
- Authorisation to sign any document and receive any notices relating to the above appeal.
- To do all other acts and things as may be necessary and proper for, or in furtherance of, any purpose of these presents.
- That the acts and things done by the attorney shall be binding on the donor.
Two attorneys are named in the CIT(A) POA specimens and both sign the acceptance. The forum is stated precisely — "CIT(A) – NFAC, Delhi" in Specimens 1 and 3, and "Income Tax Appellate Tribunal, xxx Bench xxx … in Appeal No ITA/xxxx/20xx" in Specimens 2 and 4.
Note how clause 3 in every representation specimen is drafted: "to sign any document and receive any notices relating to above appeal".
The words "relating to above appeal" are the whole safeguard. Since receipt of a notice by the donee is treated as receipt by the donor, an unrestricted notices power makes the representative the point of service for everything the authority sends the client. Confining it to the identified proceeding keeps the exposure proportionate to the engagement.
The same discipline runs through clause 1, which names the assessment years, and through the POA specimens' identification of the bench and appeal number. Together they give the instrument a natural sunset: when that appeal concludes, the power is spent.
All four representation POA specimens read "do hereby given authority" where "give" is meant.
Specimen 4 is headed for a company or firm and opens correctly — "to represent the Company / Firm … on behalf of the company / firm" — but then clause 1 reverts to "To represent me … for my appeal" and clause 5 to "shall be binding on me". Both must be changed to the company or firm when the specimen is used.
Specimen 4's clause 5 also names one attorney while the acceptance block carries two ("I Accept I Accept. A B C P Q R"). Specimen 3, the CIT(A) version for a company or firm, has it right with both names in clause 5.
And Specimen 7, the general power from a spouse working abroad, appoints "Shri A P C, my spouse" but the acceptance is signed "B D C" — the name carried over from Specimen 6.
The illness power — the widest of the POA specimens
This is the widest of the domestic POA specimens. Its recitals establish that the executant is physically not well and cannot attend in person to various matters relating to his properties, moveable and immoveable, debts and securities, lying anywhere in the Union of India — defined as the "Subject Matter" — and appoints his wife as duly constituted attorney.
The operative clause covers four heads: (a) all immoveable properties anywhere in India; (b) all savings, current or other bank accounts in any bank — cooperative, scheduled or national; (c) all investments, securities, scrips, debentures, shares, demat accounts and bank deposits held by or in the name of the executant; and (d) all other personal matters.
It then runs a very long list of verbs — to receive, pay, appoint, reappoint, cancel, revoke, substitute, engage, apply, file, withdraw, depose, declare, verify, affirm, swear affidavits, appear, open, maintain, operate or close accounts, purchase, acquire, obtain possession, dispose of, sell, gift, assign, lease, exchange, mortgage, transfer, grant licence, grant possession, negotiate, transact, execute, sign, present for registration, register, collect back originals and certified copies, file or defend suits, applications, petitions, revisions, appeals, reviews and writs, compromise, settle, abandon, waive, surrender, relinquish — and names the statutes before whose authorities the attorney may represent the executant, including the Registration Act, 1908, the Maharashtra Stamp Act, 1958, the Maharashtra Rent Control Act, 1999, the Maharashtra Land Revenue Code, 1966, the Income Tax Act, 1961 and the Maharashtra Co-operative Societies Act, 1960. It expressly permits the attorney to delegate or otherwise confer all or any of the powers on any person deemed fit, and closes with a ratification clause.
Specimen 5 contains a power to sell, gift, mortgage and transfer all the executant's immovable property anywhere in India, a power to close bank accounts, a power over all demat holdings, and an express power to delegate the whole of it to anyone.
The handbook's own warning applies to it directly: signing a POA that grants broad authority is very much like signing a blank cheque. Note also that this specimen is not designated durable, so on the handbook's own account it would end if the executant — who is already unwell — lost mental capacity.
Where the actual need is narrower, draft to the need. Where the breadth is genuinely required, add the safeguards the handbook suggests elsewhere: a second attorney for major transactions, an express reporting obligation to the family's chartered accountant, a durability designation, and a sunset. And remember that its powers over immovable property make the instrument registrable and potentially chargeable at conveyance rates.
Specimens 6 and 7 — family abroad
These two POA specimens are near-identical general powers, one given by a son leaving India for further education and one by a spouse working abroad. Six clauses:
- To invest monies in equity shares, mutual funds, bank deposits, company deposits and government or company bonds, at the attorney's absolute discretion, with power to vary or sell including operation of any demat account.
- To borrow on such terms as the attorney thinks fit upon the security of any property or investment, moveable or immoveable, and to execute mortgages, charges, pledges or other securities.
- To sign income tax returns and any other document, and to represent before income tax authorities for assessment, appeal or refund claims.
- To purchase non-risk policies from an insurer in India.
- To receive amounts due on maturity or money-back policies.
- A general acts clause with an undertaking to ratify and confirm whatever the attorney lawfully does.
Clause 2 deserves attention when adapting either form. A general power to borrow and mortgage given to a parent or spouse is a substantial grant, and one the last specimen in the book deliberately excludes.
The last of the POA specimens — an express negative
The final specimen is a special power for a non-resident's properties, appointing two attorneys "jointly or severally", each identified by Aadhaar number, with the executant's Aadhaar recorded too and two witnesses each giving an Aadhaar number.
Its powers cover representation and signature before private, semi-government and government authorities; selling or letting out the properties, signing rent lease agreements, receiving payments and issuing receipts, and evicting tenants through court; suits, complaints and appeals; compromise, arbitration, engaging advocates, executing decrees and receiving decretal amounts; depositing dues, taxes and outgoing penalties; and applying for no-objection and no-dues certificates.
And then, in capitals: "IT IS HEREBY EXPLICITLY MENTIONED THAT THE SAID SPECIAL POWER OF ATTORNEYS NEITHER HAS ANY POWER TO TAKE ANY LOANS NOR ANY POWER TO TAKE ANY MORTGAGE ON THE ABOVE PROPERTIES."
Every other specimen defines the attorney's authority by listing what he may do. Specimen 10 also states, in terms, what he may not do.
That matters because of how third parties read these instruments. A bank or a sub-registrar faced with a long enumerated list followed by a general acts clause has to judge whether borrowing falls within "all acts, deeds and things for the management, control and supervision of the affairs of the said properties". An explicit exclusion removes the judgment.
Where a client is giving a broad property power to a relative, the two clauses worth borrowing from this specimen are the express no-loan, no-mortgage exclusion and the Aadhaar identification of executant, attorneys and witnesses — the latter being what makes the instrument usable at registration.
A source note on the ninth of the POA specimens
Specimen 9's recitals set out that the executant's mother bequeathed a Pune flat equally to all four daughters by will, and then state: "Thus, the Executant owns th share in the said Scheduled Flat, along with her three sisters owning share each."
The fractions have not survived into the text layer of the published PDF — presumably vulgar-fraction glyphs that did not extract. They are not reconstructed here. The surrounding recital ("equally to all the four daughters") makes the intended share evident, but the specimen as published cannot be quoted for the figures.
Read the fractions from the printed handbook if the specimen is being used verbatim, and in any event state the share in words as well as figures when adapting it.
Practical checklist for using the POA specimens
- Start from the five-clause representation skeleton for any tax POA.
- Name the forum, assessment years, bench and appeal number precisely.
- Keep the notices power "relating to the above appeal".
- When using Specimen 4, change "me" to the company or firm in clauses 1 and 5.
- Correct "do hereby given authority" to "give" in Specimens 1 to 4.
- Do not use Specimen 5's breadth unless the need matches it — and add durability and a sunset.
- Borrow Specimen 10's express no-loan, no-mortgage clause for property powers.
- Identify executant, attorneys and witnesses by Aadhaar on registrable instruments.
Common mistakes when adapting the POA specimens
- Using a company specimen without changing the first-person clauses.
- Copying the notices clause without the proceeding-specific limitation.
- Adopting the illness specimen for a narrow purpose.
- Leaving the borrow-and-mortgage clause in a general family power.
- Quoting Specimen 9's shares from the published text.
- Omitting witnesses and Aadhaar from a POA that must be registered.