Verification Requirement for Tax Returns bars prosecution without signing or verification; later penal provision cannot operate retrospectively.

A tax prosecution under section 277 requires the accused to have made or verified the return; absence of signing or statutory verification defeats that charge and it was quashed on the admitted facts. A penal provision inserted after the alleged offences cannot be applied retrospectively to create criminal liability; the later-introduced provision was held inapplicable to offences of 1965-66. Consequential charges predicated on the invalidated tax charge were also quashed, while proceedings against other accused may continue as law permits.

---

---

Issues: (i) Whether charges under section 277 of the Income-tax Act can be sustained against the petitioner who did not sign or verify the return; (ii) Whether section 278B of the Income-tax Act (as inserted by the Taxation Laws (Amendment) Act, 1975) can be applied retrospectively to offences committed in assessment year 1965-66.

Issue (i): Whether the petitioner, who neither signed nor verified the return, could be prosecuted under section 277 of the Income-tax Act.

Analysis: The charge under section 277 requires the accused to have made or verified the false return or to be otherwise within the scope of the statutory penal provision as framed. On the admitted facts the petitioner did not sign the return nor make the statutory verification or declaration required to attract section 277; the charge framed against her depended on those factual and statutory elements.

Conclusion: The charge under section 277 cannot be sustained against the petitioner and must be quashed; this conclusion is in favour of the assessee.

Issue (ii): Whether section 278B of the Income-tax Act (inserted with effect from October 1, 1975) applies to offences committed in 1965-66.

Analysis: Section 278B was inserted into the Income-tax Act after the offences were committed. Application of that provision to acts committed prior to its insertion would create retrospective criminal liability. Article 20 of the Constitution bars creation of ex post facto penal consequences. Judicial authority cited confirms that section 278B cannot be applied to offences committed in 1965-66.

Conclusion: Section 278B cannot be given retrospective effect to prosecute the petitioner for offences of 1965-66; this conclusion is in favour of the assessee.

Final Conclusion: The charges against the petitioner founded on section 277 of the Income-tax Act and the consequential charge under section 193 IPC are quashed; the trial Magistrate may proceed against other accused as law permits.

Ratio Decidendi: A penal provision inserted after the commission of alleged offences cannot be applied retrospectively to create criminal liability, and absent the statutory acts (such as signing or verification) required by section 277 of the Income-tax Act a partner cannot be prosecuted under that provision on the admitted facts.

---