MATHIVATHANAN M K Vs. INCOME TAX OFFICER

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE petitioner is the sole accused in CC. No. 267 of 1987 pending on the file of the Additional Chief metropolitan Magistrate E. O. I., Madras. At the instance of the Income-tax officer, Investigation, City Circle V, Madras - 600 034, he is being prosecuted for the alleged commission of offences punishable under sections 193, 196 and 420, Indian Penal Code, 1860, and section 276C(2) and 277 of the Income-tax Act, 1961.

(2.) THE case of the prosecution against the petitioner is that he is an engineering contractor who wanted to take civil engineering contracts from the Public Works Department, Tamil Nadu Housing Board, etc., and for the purpose of registering himself as a contractor with the above authorities, he had to file income-tax clearance certificates as regards his income-tax dues. Though the petitioner was assessed to income-tax in City Circle V - (7), Madras, from the assessment year 1971-72 onwards, he had filed an application for and income-tax clearance certificate before the Income-tax Officer, City Circle VI - (5), Madras. In the course of the search conducted under section 132 of the Income-tax Act on October 16, 1986, two tax clearance certificates in original and several other xerox copies relating to the assessment years 1974-75 to 1981-82 were seized from the premises of the petitioner. A close look at the tax clearance certificates revealed that they had been forged. It is under these circumstances that this prosecution was initiated.

(3.) IN Nrisingha Murari Chakraborty v. State of West Bengal, , while considering the meaning of "property" under section 420 and 415, INdian penal Code, the apes court held that a passport was property. The observations of the Supreme Court can be usefully extracted (headnote) :