SHIVE GOWDA A C Vs. STATE OF MYSORE

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THESE are three revision petitions fieled under S. 55 of the Mysore Agrl. IT Act, 1957 (hereinafter referred to as the Act), by three assessees, against the order of the Tribunal. The common question of law raised in all these three revision petitions is whether, on the facts and circumstances of the case, the Tribunal having accepted that the accounts of the assessee have been maintained on the cash basis system, was justified in law in reducing the allowable expenditure.

(2.) IN each of these three cases, the agricultural crop concerned was coffee crop and the accounting year was the one ending on 31st March, 1958. (The method of accounting employed by the assessees was the cash basis method). As against the order of the Agrl. ITO each of the assessees had preferred appeals to the Mysore Sales Tax Tribunal (hereinafter referred to as the Tribunal). The contentions which had been raised before the Tribunal were, firstly that from the total realisations during the accounting year, there should be excluded such of the amounts that had been received on account of the value of the coffee crop for the prior years 1955-56 and 1956-57, as the tax payable on the coffee crops of those years had already been compounded under the provisions of the Act. This contention was based on the judgment of this High Court in W. P. No. 913 of 1959 [M.L. Narasimhiah Setty vs. Agrl. ITO (1965) 55 ITR 616 Chikmagalur]. This contention was accepted by the Tribunal and, after excluding the cash receipts attributable to the coffee crop of those prior years, the Tribunal found in the appeal, to which C.R.P. No. 617/65 relates, that the cash receipt attributable to the coffee crop of the according year was only Rs. 56,735.20P. IN the appeal to which C.R.P. No. 618 of 1965 relates, it found that the cash receipts attributable to the coffee crop of the accounting year were only Rs. 64,580.95P. IN the appeal to which C.R.P. No. 619 of 1965 relates, the Tribunal found that the cash receipts attributable to the coffee crop of the accounting year were only Rs. 1,69,215. 10P. IN regard to these findings of the Tribunal on the first point urged before it, the assessees have no grievance in these revision petitions. It is only in regard to the finding of the Tribunal on the second contention urged by them that the assessees have grievance in these three revision petitions.

(3.) THE learned High Court Government Pleader (Mr. Kulkarni) appearing for the State, plainly stated that there was no provision under the Act or the Rules which authorised the tax authorities to spread over a number of years the expenditure incurred in the accounting year and for which the assessee was entitled to deduction under S. 5(k) of the Act. THE Tribunal cannot, on the ground that, in its opinion, it would be fair and just, do something, not authorised under the Act and the Rules, to the prejudice of the assessee. Under S. 15 of the Act, the assessees sustaining a loss in agricultural income in any year is allowed to carry forward that loss and set it off against the agricultural income for the following years. This benefit given under the Act, to the assessee, will be impaired by the unauthorised apportionment made by the Tribunal of the admissible expenditure. In doing so, the Tribunal has exceeded its powers under the Act and to that extent its order will have to set aside.