GOVINDA RAO Vs. FIRST MEMBER BOARD OF REVENUE

JUDGEMENT

(1.) These are applications presented by the petitioner (assessee) in Sales Tax Revision Nos. 74 and 75 of 1951 before the First Member, Board of Revenue, who is the Commissioner of Sales tax, and the common prayer in both is that under S.24(2) of the Cochin Sales Tax Act, XV of 1121, the Commissioner be ordered to state the case and refer the following questions to this Court for decision which are stated to be questions of law arising out of his decision in the said two Revisions.

(2.) The facts as these. The assessment with reference to which the two orders of the revision were passed related to the years 1123 and 1124. The rules framed by Government under S.38 of the said Act, XV of 1121 were amended on 4th September 1947 corresponding to 19th Chingon 1123. R.9 as amended provides, under the heading 'License' that:-

(3.) In this case, however, the Officer forwarded the application made by the petitioner to the Commissioner who passed orders on 1.8.1950 rejecting licences for the years 1123 and 1124 and granting one for the year 1125 as in his view the retrospective effect with which a licence could be issued under the rules could not go further back than the year in which the application is made. We do not feel called upon to decide one way or the other as regards the correctness of the Commissioner's conclusion upon this point. It is sufficient to say that the Commissioner had jurisdiction to decide the question and he did decide it against the applicant and the licence applied for was refused. The circumstance that the decision is erroneous, assuming it is so, will not make it any the less binding upon the party because an authority having jurisdiction to decide can decide rightly as well as wrongly. This proposition is indisputable.