T S SRINIVASAN Vs. COMMISSIONER OF EXPENDITURE TAX

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE assessee in this case was the karta of a Hindu undivided family consisting of himself, his wife, and his four minor children. During the assessment years 1959-60 and 1960-61, the assessee, in his capacity as karta of the said family, spent Rs. 9,529 and Rs. 21,643, respectively, for the benefit of his wife and minor children. THE Hindu undivided family became disrupted on December 21, 1959, and in the family partition certain properties were allotted to the wife and minor children of the assessee. After the said partition, in the assessment year 1961-62, a sum of Rs. 13,923 was spent by the wife and children from out of the properties allotted to them.

(2.) THE assessee filed separate returns for the assessment years 1959-60 and 1960-61, one in each year in his individual capacity and another in his capacity as the karta of the Hindu undivided family. In his individual returns he did not include the expenditure incurred by him as karta of the family for the benefit of his wife and minor children. THE said expenditure had, however, been included in the returns filed by him as karta of the Hindu undivided family. THE original individual assessments for 1959-60 and 1960-61 were completed on December 31, 1959, and December 31, 1960, on a taxable expenditure of Rs. 3,749 and Rs. 1,724, respectively. THE expenditure incurred by the assessee as karta for his wife and children was not included in his individual assessments, but the said expenditure had, however, been included in the assessments of the Hindu undivided family which was, however, declared not liable to expenditure-tax for those years.

(3.) WITH regard to the inclusion of the expenditure incurred by the Hindu undivided family on the assessee's wife and minor children in his individual assessment, the assessee had contended that the Hindu undivided family had an obligation to maintain his wife and children, that it was in discharge of that obligation that the Hindu undivided family had incurred the expenditure in question, that he himself was not under an obligation to maintain his wife and children so long as the Hindu undivided family was in existence and that, therefore, the expenditure in question should not be included in his individual assessments. The Tribunal rejected this contention also holding that even if the Hindu undivided family had an obligation to maintain the wife and minor children of the assessee, still, he, as an individual, was not absolved from his own personal obligation to maintain his wife and children and that, therefore, it should be taken that the expenditure incurred by the Hindu undivided family on the assessee's wife and children was in respect of an obligation of the assessee himself.