VR KR S FIRM Vs. VXL INDIA LIMITED

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS is a petition to revise an order of the Subordinate judge of Devakottai dismissing an application of the petitioner, who is the plaintiff in a suit, to direct the Income-tax Officer, Third Circle, Karaikudi, to produce certain documents, the details of which were mentioned and which are alleged to have been filed during assessment proceedings relating to the first defendant for the assessment years 1941-42 to 1948-49. The petition in the first instance was posted before Natesan J. who thought that there was a conflict of opinion in regard to the effect of the repeal of section 137 of the income-tax Act, 1961 The question is what precisely is the effect of the omission of section 137 from the Income-tax Act, 1961, by the Finance Act, 1964 " The effect of a repeal--and we proceed on the assumption that omission of a section from the statute book is tantamount to a repeal--is, generally speaking, as if the repealed Act never existed except as to things completed or closed. But in view of this effect, the Indian Legislature enacted the General clauses Act, 1897, which has been more or less modelled on the provisions of the English Interpretation Act. Section 6 of the Indian Act, which corresponds to section 38 of the Interpretation Act, defines the effect of the repeal, of which the part material for present purposes reads "where this Act, or any Central Act or Regulation made after the commencement of this Act, repeals any enactment hitherto made or hereafter to be made, then, unless a different intention appears, the repeal shall not-- (c) affect any right, privilege, obligation or liability acquired, accrued or incurred under any enactment so repealed. . . " *

(2.) HOW this provision is to be applied has been indicated by the Supreme Court in State of Punjab v. Mohar Singh "the line of enquiry would be, not whether the new act expressly keeps alive old rights and liabilities but whether it manifests an intention to destroy them. We cannot therefore subscribe to the broad proposition that section 6 of the General Clauses Act is ruled out when there is repeal of an enactment followed by a fresh legislation. Section 6 would be applicable in such cases also unless the new legislation manifests an intention incompatible with or contrary to the provisions of the section. Such incompatibility would have to be ascertained from a consideration of all the relevant provisions of the new law and the mere absence of a saving clause is by itself not material. " *