Joint search warrant under Income-tax law bars separate individual assessment; assessment must follow the recognised joint status.

Where a search warrant under the Income-tax Act is issued in the joint names of multiple persons, the seized material cannot be used to make a separate individual assessment against only one person. The Allahabad HC followed its earlier Division Bench ruling and treated the joint warrant as requiring assessment in the joint status recognised by law, namely as an Association of Persons or Body of Individuals. The Court rejected the revenue's attempt to distinguish the earlier decision and held that the factual setting attracted the same principle, making individual assessments on the basis of a joint search impermissible.

---

---

Issues: Whether, where a search warrant under the Income-tax Act is issued in the joint names of multiple persons, separate individual assessments can be made on the basis of the material seized, or whether the assessments must be made only in the joint status as an Association of Persons or Body of Individuals.

Analysis: The search and seizure operations were conducted pursuant to a warrant of authorisation issued in the joint names of the persons concerned. The Court followed the earlier Division Bench ruling that when the authorising authority proceeds on a joint warrant, it is not open to the Assessing Officer to pick out one person and make an individual assessment on the basis of the material seized in that joint search. The Court rejected the revenue's attempt to distinguish the earlier ruling and held that the factual setting was covered by the same principle. The Court also noted that the assessments could be made in the joint status recognised by law, namely as an Association of Persons or Body of Individuals.

Conclusion: Separate individual assessments on the basis of a joint search warrant were held impermissible, and the revenue's appeals failed.

Ratio Decidendi: Where search action is authorised in the joint names of persons, the assessment based on the seized material cannot be made in the individual capacity of only one of them; the permissible course is assessment in the joint status recognised by the Act.

---