HAZARILAL Vs. COMMISSIONER OF INCOME TAX

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE Income-tax Appellate Tribunal, Hyderabad Bench, has under section 66(2) of the Indian Income-tax Act referred the following question for determination :

(2.) THE reference relates to the assessment year 1953-54, the relevant accounting period being the year ending October 18, 1952. THE assessee is an individual. According to the Income-tax Officer, he had purchased a house for Rs. 30,000 from the Abdul Wahab on August 16, 1952, though in the name of his wife, Sarlabai. He does not admit the truth of this contention. His case is that his wife, Sarlabai, is the purchaser who having sold 200 tolas of her gold ornaments and made the said purchase with the help of the sale proceeds of the ornaments plus Rs. 3,000 which she had already in cash. When called upon to substantiate the sale, the assessee produced patties for sale of bullion, called his eldest brother, Mahadev Prasad, as a witness and filed the affidavit of his wife. THE elder brother deposed that, at the time of marriage, the assessees wife got jewels of about 200 tolas in weight as dowry some 25 years ago, though he himself got only six tolas of gold as dowry land the eldest son of the assessee who was recently married received only 30 tolas of gold. THE wife in her affidavit stated that she got 72 tolas from her mother-in-law and 207 tolas from her parents in her marriage which took place 25 years ago and that all these jewels of the total weigh of 279 tolas were sold away. Her husband, the assessee, however, stated that, after the sale of the jewellery, his wife still possessed 50 tolas of gold jewels. This discrepancy with regard to the total extent of jewels that the wife possessed, in the circumstances of the case, seems to have weighed with the income-tax authorities. If what she possessed was only 279 tolas and all of them were sold away, it was not possible for her to be still in possession of 50 tolas. One other circumstance which was noticed by the Tribunal was that what appeared from the patties produced was the sale of certain bullion and that no jewels were sold and further the patties were not in the name of the wife. THE Tribunal, therefore, came to the conclusion that the story that she got 279 tolas of gold could not be believed and that, what were sold were jewels of the wife is difficult to accept; and, having regard to the discrepancy between the statement of the assessee and his wife contained in the affidavit, the conclusion of the Income-tax Officer that the purchase money cannot be traced to the sale of the jewellery of the wife and it must be the income from undisclosed sources is correct. On that basis, the Appellate Assistant Commissioners order was confirmed by the Tribunal.

(3.) BUT the position will be different if there is no evidence on record in support of the finding of the Tribunal or the finding is such that no reasonable man would come to, on the basis of the material on record. It is contended that the present case bears close analogy to the facts in the supreme Court case in the above decision and therefore. BUT it would appear that those facts have in fact no parallel in the present case. In that case, the Tribunal had misread the affidavits, improperly rejected the evidence, failed to take into consideration some of the evidence already on record, pointed out certain things as loopholes in the case, even though there were no loopholes at all and their finding was rested on mere conjectures, surmises and suspicions. Such is not the case here. As already pointed out, on the evidence on record, the Tribunal came to the conclusion that the source of consideration for the purchase sale proceeds of bullion, the patties of which stood in his name, could not be traced to this wife who had failed to establish that she had the jewels which in fact were sold in the shape of bullion and he sale proceeds thereof constituted the consideration of the purchase of the property.