Hindu joint family character of ancestral property turns on potentiality of a coparcener by birth or adoption

Ancestral property retained by a sole surviving coparcener after partition remains assessable as Hindu joint family property, not as individual property, for income-tax and wealth-tax purposes if there is a continuing possibility of a coparcener arising by birth or adoption. The article favours the line of authority that treats that potentiality as the decisive test, rather than the breadth of the holder's power of alienation. It distinguishes earlier decisions based on the opposite view and notes that the same reasoning applies to the relevant statutory expression.

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Issues: Whether the property in the hands of a sole surviving coparcener is assessable as an individual or as Hindu joint family property for income-tax and wealth-tax purposes.

Analysis: The reference turned on the character of ancestral property retained by a sole surviving coparcener after partition. The Court preferred the line of authority which treated the decisive test as the potentiality of a coparcener coming into existence by birth or adoption, rather than the breadth of the holder's power of alienation. On that approach, so long as such potentiality exists, the property retains the character of joint family property. The Court distinguished decisions applying the earlier view and accepted that the same reasoning applied to the expression

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