The question that was referred to the High Court by the Tribunal under s. 66 1 of the Indian Income tax Act, 1922 hereinafter called.
S. Desai, P. L. Juneja, R. N. Sachthey and S. P. Nayar, for the appellant.
The Judgment of the Court was delivered by JAGANMOHAN REDDY, J. This appeal is by certificate and though numberreasons have been given for the grant of it, the learned advocate for the respondent does number companytest that a question of law does arise and has number objected to the certificate.
the Act is as follows Whether, on the facts and in the circumstances of the case, the Tribunal was right in holding that in the matter of calculation of undistributed balance of the total income of an assessee for the purpose of levy of super tax in terms of S. 23 A 1 of the Income tax Act, 1922, the Income tax Officer should have taken into companysideration dividend declared by the companypany after the period of 12 months immediately following the expiry of the previous years relevant to the assessment years 1958 59 and 1959 60 but before the date on which the orders under S. 23 A 1 had been made by the Income tax Officer ?
CIVIL APPELLATE JURISDICTION C. A. Nos.
The High Court has answered that question in the affirmative and against the department following the reasoning which was obiter in the case of Moore Avenue Properties Private Ltd. v. C.I.T. 1 1 59 I.T.R. 466.
This submission was rejected by the Income tax Officer who sought to assess the respondent by including Rs.
15,000 and Rs.
90,000/ declared as dividends at the general meetings held on December 17, 1959 and May 26, 1960 in respect of the relevant assessment years.
On behalf of the respondent it was submitted that once dividends were declared before an order is made under this section numbersuper tax can be levied in respect of those dividends.
The order of the Income tax Officer was dated October 31, 1961.
The assessment relating to which the Income tax Officer sought to exercise his jurisdiction under that section was for the years 1958 59 and 1959 60 for which the accounting year ended on 30th June 1957 and 30th June 1958 respectively.
C. Setalvad, S. Roy Chowdhary and G. S. Chatterjee, for the respondent.
The companytention of the appellant is that the companypany had, declared the dividends after the 12 months following the accounting year and hence the Income tax Officer had with the previous sanction of the Inspecting Assistant Commis sioner, validly subjected the companypany to super tax in terms of the latter part of s. 23 A 1 .
An appeal to the Appellate Assistant Commissioner was unsuccessful.
Appeals by certificate from the judgment and order dated May 21, 1968 of the Calcutta High Court in Income tax Reference No.
1378 and 1379 of 1969.
17 of 1965.
