COMMISSIONER OF INCOME TAX Vs. GHANTA BAPANIAH

JUDGEMENT

(1.) IN all these references, the common question that has been referred for our opinion, which arises out of assessment proceedings for the years 1953-54 and 1954-55 made on February 2, 1962, relating to a father and his four sons constituting a Hindu undivided family is as follows :

(2.) THE assessees were coparceners of a Hindu undivided family, which was assessed through its karta, Ghanta Bapaniah, the assessee in R. C. No. 54/55. THE family owned certain buses and ran a bus service. In the course of the assessment for the year 1953-54, it was claimed that a partition had taken place on January 1, 1952, and accordingly it was prayed that that fact may be recorded and an order passed under Section 25A of the Income-tax Act, 1922 (hereinafter called "the Act"). About the same time, each of the individual coparceners, on the basis that the joint family was divided, filed for the assessment years 1953-54 and 1954-55 individual returns on March 31, 1954, and December 21, 1954, respectively. Separate files were opened for the assessees, the erstwhile karta and the other coparceners, for those two years and the receipt of the returns of income was recorded therein. THE claim of the Hindu undivided family to record the partition under Section 25A was rejected by the Income-tax Officer by his order dated March 27, 1958, in these words :

(3.) ALL the assessees then went up in appeal to the Appellate Assistant Commissioner and, before him, their main contentions were :