Commissioner Of Income-Tax vs Karachi Taxi Company
1994 Latest Caselaw 59 Del

JUDGMENT

D.K. Jain, J.

1. By this petition under section 256(2) of the Income-tax Act, 1961 (for short, "the Act"), pertaining to the assessment year 1984-85, the Revenue seeks a direction to the Income-tax Appellate Tribunal to refer the following questions, stated to be questions of law, for the opinion of this court :

"(i) Whether, on the facts and in the circumstances of the case, the Income-tax Appellate Tribunal was justified in law in deleting the income of Rs. 6,50,000 as confirmed by the Commissioner of Income-tax (Appeals) on the basis of the material on record?

(ii) Whether, on the facts and in the circumstances of the case, the Income-tax Appellate Tribunal was correct in law in directing the acceptance of book results in the assessed's case for the year under consideration contradicting its own finding in the assessment year 1983-84 in similar circumstances, regarding rejection of books of account and applicability of section 145(2) in the assessed's case itself?

(iii) Whether, on the facts and in the circumstances of the case, the directions of the Income-tax Appellate Tribunal for acceptance of the book results and deletion of the income of Rs. 6,50,000 were not inconsistent with the evidence and material on record and based on a view wherein the essential matters had been overlooked?"

2. The petition is vehemently opposed by Mr. C. S. Aggarwal, learned counsel for he assessed, primarily on the ground that before deleting the addition of Rs. 6.50 lakhs made to the results declared by the assessed, the Tribunal has compared the results for the assessment year in question with the income assessed for the preceding assessment year, including the additions made in that year and has found as a fact that the declared results for the present assessment year are better placed than those of the preceding year. He submits that this being a finding of fact, the question whether the provisions of section 145(2) of the Act are attracted in the instant case or not would be of academic interest only and, therefore, the reference need not be called for.

3. Without expressing any final opinion at this stage, lest it prejudice the issue involved, for the purpose of the present petition, it would sufficient to say that prima facie, we are not quite satisfied that there was sufficient material before the Tribunal to come to the conclusion that the books of account of the assessed were reliable and could not be rejected. We are, therefore, of the opinion that a opinion that a question of law does arise out of the order of the Tribunal. We would accordingly direct the Tribunal to state a case and refer the following question of law for the opinion of this court :

"Whether, on the facts and in the circumstances of the case, there was material before the Tribunal justifying the deletion of the addition of Rs. 6.50 lakhs made to the results declared by the assessed?"

4. There will be no order as to costs.