RAMJIBHAI HANSIJIBAHI PATEL Vs. CIT

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is a reference under sec. 66(1) of the Indian Income Tax Act 1922 The assessee Ramjibhai Hansijibhai Patel is assessed to income-tax as an individual The assessment year with which we are concerned is the year 1948-49 the accounting year being Samvat Year 2003 i.e the period from 25th October 1946 to 12th November 1947. The assessee had been living in Johannesburg in Africa for a long time. He came to India in April 1946 and left for Africa in September 1948. He was at the material time a co-parcener in a Hindu undivided family which owned and maintained a house at Varad in Surat District. The. expenses for maintaining this house were met by the Hindu undivided family out of its own resources. In connection with this house the Appellate Assistant Commissioner found as under:

(2.) This finding of the Appellate Assistant Commissioner has in fact not been disputed before us. The assessee when he visited India stayed for some time at this ancestral family house at Varad. The assessee submitted a return in response to a notice issued against him under sec 34. In the return he showed his status as that of a non-resident The Income Tax Officer came to the conclusion that the assessee was a resident as in his view the requirements of both clauses (i) and (ii) of sub-sec. (a) of sec. 4A of the Income Tax Act 1922 were satisfied. He held that the assessee though resident was not ordinarily resident The assessee preferred an appeal to the Appellate Assistant Commissioner contending that he was a non-resident. This contention was also rejected by the Appellate Assistant Commissioner. The matter was carried further to the Income Tax Appellate Tribunal. The Tribunal took the view that the requirements of sec. 4A(a)(ii) were satisfied and that the assessee was rightly treated as a resident. The assessee being aggrieved by this decision of the Tribunal required the Tribunal to refer to us three questions of law which according to the assessee arose from the order of the Tribunal. The Tribunal took the view that only one question of law arose from the order of the Tribunal and the Tribunal accordingly referred the same to us for our decision The question referred to us is the following:

(3.) It is not disputed that during the relevant accounting year the assessee was in British India. It is also not disputed that the ancestral family house situate at Varad was in existence for a period exceeding one hundred and eighty-two days in that year. The only question that has been debated before us is whether by reason of the existence of the ancestral family house it could be said on the facts of the present case that the assessee maintained or had maintained for him a dwelling place. The house in question belonged to the joint family of which the assessee was a co-parcener. The joint family was not merely the owner of the house but the house was being used by the joint family for the purpose of residence of the members of the joint family and was in the true sense a dwelling place within the meaning of sec. 4A(a)(ii) of the Act. The expenses in connection with the maintenance of this dwelling place were defrayed out of the joint family funds. It was the joint family which maintained this dwelling place for the benefit of the members of the joint family. The assessee himself took the benefit of this dwelling place whenever he wanted to do so and actually stayed there. He had a legal right to stay in this dwelling place. It was urged on behalf of the assessee that as the assessee was being assessed as an individual in order that the provisions of the section might be satisfied it was requisite that as an individual he must maintain a dwelling place or he must have maintained for him such dwelling place. It was strongly urged that as the dwelling house in question was not maintained by him as an individual nor was it maintained for him as an individual but was maintained for him and other members of the joint family by the joint family the requirements of the section were not satisfied. We cannot accept this submission. The mere fact that the assessee is an individual would not of necessity require that the dwelling place must be main-tained by him or for him as an individual. If he is a member of a Hindu undivided family and that family has maintained a dwelling place for him and other members of the family the requirements of the section could be said to be satisfied. It was also urged that if a dwelling place was maintained for the assessee without his consent or against his will it could not be said that he has maintained for him a dwelling place. It is however not necessary for us to go into this question on the facts of the present case in as much as there is nothing on the record which would show that this joint family dwelling place was being maintained by the joint family without the consent or against the will of the assessee. On the contrary the finding is that not merely was this dwelling place maintained by the joint family out of joint family funds that not merely had the assessee a legal right to use this dwelling place for himself but that he in fact took the benefit of this dwelling house and stayed therein whenever he wanted. In the light of these facts it is not possible for us to hold that he has not maintained for himself a dwelling place within the meaning of the section.