COMMISSIONER OF AGRICULTURAL INCOME TAX Vs. PANNI KUNHAPPA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) At the instance of the Revenue, the Kerala Agricultural Income Tax Appellate Tribunal, Additional Bench, Kozhikode has referred the following question of law for the decision of this Court:

(2.) The respondent is an assessee to Agricultural Income tax on the files of the Additional Agricultural Income tax Officer, Taliparamba. We are concerned herein with the assessment year 1975-76 for which the accounting period ended on 31-3-1975. The Agricultural Income tax Officer, by order dated 9-2-1981, determined the total agricultural income of the respondent/assessee at Rs.26,831.50. Thereafter, he gave an exemption of 1/6th of the income for the share income from the firm already assessed, amounting to Rs. 24,851.50, and the exemption was fixed at Rs.4,141.83. So, the net income was fixed at Rs.22,689.67, rounded to Rs.22,690/-. The prayer of the assessee was that the limitation of exemption specified in the first proviso to S.10 of the Agricultural Income Tax Act, to the effect that the exemption shall not exceed one-sixth of the total agricultural income or six thousand rupees whichever is less, is applicable only to S.10(1)(e) of the Act and will not cover the other clauses in S.10(1) of the Act. The Agricultural Income Tax Appellate Tribunal, Additional Bench, Kozhikode, by order dated 12-11-1982, held that the proviso in clause (c)-(e) of sub-s.(1) of S.10 will apply only to the limiting of exemption referred to in that clause alone. It is thereafter, at the instance of the Revenue, the question of law formulated herein above has-been referred by the Appellate Tribunal for the decision of this Court.

(3.) We heard counsel. S.10(1) provides for exemption from assessment of Agricultural Income tax. It provides as follows (as per the official publication of the Act by the Government of Kerala in 1976):