Original assessment must wait for statutory return period; reopening power cannot bypass the notice-and-return procedure.

Section 71 provided the normal and mandatory procedure for original assessments, giving the taxpayer the statutory opportunity to furnish a return before assessment. Section 72 was confined to reopening settled cases and making additional assessments, including where later information came to light, and could not be used as an alternative route to bypass the notice-and-return machinery for an original assessment. Read together, the provisions preserved the protection afforded by section 71. The original assessments made before expiry of the time allowed for a return were therefore premature, invalid, and set aside.

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Issues: Whether the revenue could make original assessments under section 72 of the East African Income Tax (Management) Act, 1952 before the expiry of the time allowed for furnishing a return under section 71 read with section 59(1).

Analysis: The scheme of the Act treated section 71 as the normal and mandatory machinery for original assessments. A taxpayer was entitled to the statutory opportunity to furnish a return before any assessment could be made in the ordinary course. Section 72 was construed as dealing with reopening of cases already settled under the normal procedure and with additional assessments, including cases brought to light by later information, but not as an alternative route for bypassing the notice-and-return machinery in respect of an original assessment. Reading the two provisions together, the words in section 72 were restricted so as not to defeat the protection afforded by section 71.

Conclusion: Section 72 could not be used to make the impugned original assessments before the expiry of the time allowed under section 71. The assessments were invalid and had to be set aside.

Final Conclusion: The appeal succeeded because the assessments were made prematurely and outside the statutory procedure governing original assessments.

Ratio Decidendi: Section 72 is confined to reopening or additional assessment cases after the normal section 59 and section 71 machinery has run its course, and cannot be invoked to make an original assessment before the taxpayer's statutory time to return income has expired.

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