Case: Y. Narayana Chetty &amp; Another Vs. The Income-Tax Officer, Nellore And Others

1. These four appeals arise from four petitions filed against the Income-tax Officer, Nellore Circle, Nellore, respondent 1, in respect of the proceedings taken by him against three firms under S. 34, Income-tax Act (hereinafter called the Act). The firm M/s. Bellapu Audeyya and Chilla Pitchayya was formed on 20-4-1936, and it was dissolved on 31-3-l948. It consisted of two partners, Chilla Pitchayya and Bellapu Audeyya. Chilla Pitchayya had started another firm in the name and style of G. Pitchayya and Co. with another partner R. Subba Rao. This firm was formed on 30-7-1941, and it was dissolved onBellapu Audeyya and Chilla Pitchayya had also formed another firm along with five other partners which carried on its business in the name and style of Prabhat Textiles. This firm was formed on 1-12-1941, and it was dissolved by a decree of the civil Court passed on 22-12-1949, the dissolution having taken effect fromAll the three firms were carrying on business in yarn and cloth and all of them were registered under S. 26A of the Act. It appears that for the purpose of assessing the income of these firms for the years 1943-44 and 1944-45, respondent 1 was satisfied on making enquiries that each of the three firms was a separate entity and so separate assessment orders were passed in respect of the income of each one of them for the said two years.2. Subsequently on 14-8-1951, respondent 1 issued notice against the firm of Prabhat Textiles under S. 34 of the Act. In the proceedings thus commenced, respondent 1 held that the firm of Prabhat Textiles was a fictitious firm and that the real partners were C. Pitchayya and B. Audeyya. As a result of this finding, respondent 1 cancelled the registration of the said firm under R. 6B of the Income-tax Rules and passed fresh orders of assessment against the said firm on the basis that it was an unregistered firm for the assessment years 1943-44 and 1944-45.on 14-8-1952, and 25-2 1953, respectively. Similar action was taken by respondent 1 in respect of the two other firms on the same dates.Thereupon Y. Narayayana Chetty, one of the partners of the Prabhat Textiles file a writ petition in the High Court of Madras, No. 613 of 1952, against respondent 1 under Art. 216 of the Constitution and prayed that the High Court should issue a writ of prohibition or any other appropriate writ, order or direction prohibiting the first respondent from continuing the proceedings as per his notice of 14-8-1951, and from enforcing the order of fresh assessment passed in the said proceedings on 14.8-1952, in regard to the assessment year 1943-1944. In respect of the same firm Chilla Pitchayya sought for a similar relief by Writ Petition No. 201 of 1953 in regard to the proceedings and assessment order for the assessment year 1944-45. The same Chilla Pitchayya also filed Writ Petitions Nos. 629 of 1952 and 202 of 1953 in respect of the proceedings taken and fresh assessment orders passed against the two remaining firms for the assessment years 1943-44 and 1944-45 respectively. The four petitions were heard together by the High Court and were dismissed on 5-3-1954. The petitioners then applied for and obtained from the High Court a certificate under Art. 133 read with O. 45, Rr. 1, 2, 3 and 8 that the value of the subject-matter in the petitions before the High Court as well as of the appeals before this Court was more than Rs. 20,000. It is with this certificate that the four appeals have come before this Court. Y. Narayana Chetty is the appellant in Civil Appeal No. 317 of 1957 whereas Chilla Pitchayya is the appellant in Civil Appeals Nos. 318, 319 and 320 of 1957.4. In the High Court it was urged by the appellants that the proceedings taken under S. 34 against each of the said firms were without jurisdiction and void. It was also contended that the cancellation of the registration of each of the firms was similarly void and without jurisdiction inasmuch as R. 6B under which the said order of cancellation was passed was ultra vires the Central Board of Revenue which promulgated the rules under the powers conferred on it by the Act. Besides the appellants attacked the validity of the orders passed against them under S. 34 on the ground that it was illegal to assess escaped income under S. 34 on the basis that the firms were unregistered firms while maintaining the original assessment for the said firms on the basis that they had been duly registered under S. 26A of the Act. The High Court has held against the appellants on all these points. Besides the High Court has stated in its judgment that it was admitted by the appellants before it that appeals had been filed against each one of the orders challenged in the writ proceedings and the High Court thought that that itself would suffice to justify its refusal to exercise its jurisdiction under Art. 226 of the Constitution. However, since the primary relief asked or by the appellants in their respective petitions was the issue of a writ of prohibition the High Court felt that it may as well deal with the merits of the contentions raised by the appellants. That is why the High Court examined the merits of the said contentions. On behalf of the appellants, Mr. Viswanatha Sastri has raised the same three points before us.

Court's reasoning:
In the present case the Income-tax Officer has purported to act under, S. 34 (1) (a) against the three firms. The said sub-section provides inter alia that "if the Income-tax Officer has reason to believe that by reason of the omission or failure on the part of the assessee to make a return of his income under S. 22 for any year or to disclose fully and truly all material facts necessary for his assessment for that year, income, profits or gains chargeable to income-tax has been under-assesse ," he may, within the time prescribed, "serve on the assessee a notice containing all or any of the requirements which may be included in the notice under(2) of S. 22 and may proceed to re-assess such income, profits or gains." The argument is that the service of the requisite notice on the assessee is a condition precedent to the validity of any re-assessment made under S. 34; and if a valid notice is not issued as required, proceedings taken by the Income-tax Officer in pursuance of an invalid notice and consequent orders of re-assessment passed by him would be void and inoperative. In our opinion, this contention is well-founded.The notice prescribed by S. 34 cannot be regarded as a mere procedural requirement; it is only if the said notice is served on the assessee as required that the Income- tax Officer would be justified in taking proceedings against him. If no notice is issued or if the notice issued is shown to be invalid then the validity of the proceedings taken by the Income-tax Officer without a notice or in pursuance of an invalid notice would be illegal andour opinion, this argument is not well-founded. Section 3 of the Act which is the charging section provides inter alia that "where any Central Act enacts that income-tax can be charged for any year at any rate or rates, tax at that rate or those rates shall be charged for that year in accordance with and subject to the provisions of this Act in respect of the total income of the previous year of every firm;"in other words, a firm is specifically treated as an assessee by S.Besides, the word "person" used by S. 2(2) of the Act while defining the assessee, would obviously include a firm under S. 3 (39) of the General Clauses Act since it provides that a person includes "any company or association or body of individuals whether incorporated or not". Therefore, it would not be correct to say that an assessee under S. 2,(2) of the Act necessarily means an individual partner and does not include a firm. The argument based upon the relevant provisions of S. 23 (5 ) it also not valid because it is obvious that for the purposes of assessment at all relevant and material stages under Ss. 22 and 23 it is the firm that is treated as an assessee. When a return of the income is made for the relevant year, it is a return with regard to the total income of the firm that has to be submitted under S. 22; and when assessment is levied under S. 23, the Income-tax Officer determines and can determine the total income of each partner of the firm only after ascertaining the total income of the firm itself. It is true that S. 23(5) as it then stood required the Income-tax Officer to determine the total income of each partner of the firm including his share of the firms income and to assess each partner in respect of such income, and in that sense individual partner of the firm undoubtedly became liable to pay income-tax; but it is clear that in determining the total income of each partner his share in the firms income has to be included and so the firm does not cease to be an assessee for the purpose of S.provision clearly shows that the person to whom the first part of the provision refers includes a firm and it lays down that if a firm commits a default as indicated the Income-tax Officer may refuse to register it or may cancel its registration if it is already registered.Thus there can be no doubt that S. 28 (4) treats the firm as an assessee and provides for the imposition of penalty against the firm in case the firm commits any of the defaults indicated in the sub-section. The effect of the relevant provisions of S. 23 therefore is that for the assessment of the total taxable income it is the affairs of the assessee firm that are investigated and examined and when the total income of the firm is ascertained, it is allocated to its individual partners in proportion to their respective shares. The result of such allocation undoubtedly is to make the partners liable to pay tax in respect of their taxable income thus allocated; but that cannot justify the inference that the firm is not an assessee in the relevantare, therefore, satisfied that it is not open to the appellants to contend that the proceedings taken by the Income-tax Officer under S.34(1)(a) are invalid in that notices of these proceedings have not been served on the other allege partners of the firms. Incidentally it may be pointed out that the finding of the Income-tax Officer in respect of all the three firms is that the only persons who had interest in the business carried on by the said firms were B. Audeyya and C. Pitchayya.It is remarkable that B. Audeyya has not cared to challenge the proceedings or to question the validity of the fresh assessment orders passed by the Income-tax Officer in the presentappellant suggests that the only cases in which such registration can he cancelled are those prescribed in S. 23 (4). We have no doubt that this argument is fallacious. The cancellation of registration under S. 23 (4) is in the nature of a penalty and the penalty can he imposed against a firm if it is guilty of any of the defaults mentioned in the said sub--section. It would be noticed that where registration is cancelled under S. 23 (4), there is no doubt that the application for registration had been properly granted. The basis of an order under S. 23 (4) is not that the firm which had been registered was a fictitious one, but that, though the registered firm was genuine, by its failure to comply with the requirements of law it had incurred the penalty of having its registration cancelled. That is the effect of the provisions of S. 23 (4). On the other hand, R. 6B deals with cases where the Income-tax Officer is satisfied that a certificate of registration has been granted under R. 4 or under R. 6A without there being a genuine firm in existence; that is to say an application for registration had been made in the name of a firm which really did not exist; andon that ground the Income-tax Officer proposes to set right the matter by cancelling the certificate which should never have born granted to the alleged firm. That being the effect of R. 6B it is impossible to accede to the argument that the provisions of this rule are inconsistent with the provisions of S. 23 (4) of the Act. If the Income-tax Officer is empowered under S. 26A read with the relevant rules to grant or refuse the request of the firm for registration, it would normally be open to him to cancel such registration if he discovers that registration had been erroneously granted to a firm which did not exist. R. 6B has been made to clarify this position and to confer on the Income-tax Officer in express and specific terms such authority to review his own decision in the matter of the registration of the firm when he discovers that his earlier decision proceeded on a wrong assumption about the existence of the firm. In our opinion, there is no difficulty in holding that R. 6B is obviously intended to carry out the purpose of the Act and since it is not inconsistent with any of the provisions of the Act its validity is not open to doubt.It is, however, urged that whereas the firm aggrieved by the order passed by the Income-tax Officer under S. 23 (4) can challenge the correctness or propriety of the order in an appeal against the final assessment order passed under S. 23, no such remedy is available to the firm whose registration is cancelled under R. 6B.We are not impressed by this argument. The validity of the rule cannot, in our opinion, be challenged merely on the ground that no appeal has been provided against the order passed under the impugned rule. It is also true that where-as before taking action under S. 23 (4) the Income-tax Officer is required to issue a notice to the firm, no such provision is made under R.being so we do not think that it would be open to the appellant to contend that the order passed against him under R. 6B is invalid on the purely academic ground that R. 6B does not require notice to be issued before the registration of a firm is cancelled. If the power under R. 6B is exercised by the Income-tax Officer against a firm without giving it a notice in that behalf and without affording it an opportunity to satisfy the officer that it is a genuine firm, may be open to the firm to question the validity of the order on that grounds. We are, however, not called upon to deal with such a case in the present appeals, In this connection we may incidentally refer to the decision of this Court in Ravula Subba Rao v. Commr. of I.T., Madras, 1956 S C R 577 : ((S) AIR 1956 SC 604  ) where this Court has held that rules (2) and (6) of the rules framed under S. 59 of the Indian income-tax Act are not ultra vires the rule-makingdo not propose to deal with the merits of this contention. There can be no doubt that it would be open to the appellants to raise this contention in the appeals which they have filed against the fresh orders of assessment. We understand that applications have been made by the appellants in respect of the said orders of assessment under S. 27 of the Act. If that be so, the appellants may, if it is open to them to do so ventilate their grievance in the said proceedings also. We hold that this contention cannot be urged in petitions for writs of prohibition under Art. 226 of the Constitution, since they do not raise any question of jurisdiction.All that the appellants would be able to argue on this ground would be that the course adopted by the Income-tax Officer in making orders of fresh assessment is irregular and illogical and should be corrected. That is a matter concerning the merits of the orders of assessment and by no stretch of imagination can it be said to raise any question of jurisdiction under Art.That is why we express no opinion on this point.Before we part with this case we would like to observe that Mr. Kripal for the respondent sought to raise three preliminary objections. He urged that the issue of a writ is a discretionary matter and since the High Court has refused to exercise its discretion in favour of the appellants the appeals would be virtually incompetent inasmuch as this Court would be slow to interfere with the exercise of discretion by the High Court. He also argued that the original petitions to the High Court are incompetent under Art. 226 since under the Act the appellants had an alternative effective remedy available to them in the form of appeals against the impugned orders and in fact they had filed such appeals and had also made applications under S. 27 of the Act. Mr. Kripal also contended that the High Court would have no jurisdiction to issue a writ of prohibition against the tax authorities. We do not propose to consider these objections because, as we have already indicated, we are satisfied that the view taken by the High Court on the points raised before it is right. These objections may have to be considered in future on a suitable occasion.