Income-tax record disclosure: omission of section 137 left no statutory bar to civil court summons of records after April 1964.

After the omission of section 137 of the Income-tax Act from 1 April 1964, there was no surviving statutory bar preventing a civil court from calling for and receiving income-tax records for later periods. Section 6 of the General Clauses Act did not preserve the omitted confidentiality restriction for those records, and the notifications under section 138(2) were confined to banking companies rather than creating a general prohibition on disclosure. Section 138(1)(b) was treated as an enabling provision for voluntary furnishing of information by the Commissioner, not as a limit on the civil court's power to summon documents. The objection to production therefore failed.

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Issues: Whether, after the omission of section 137 of the Income-tax Act, 1961, the civil court could call for and receive income-tax records relating to periods after 1 April 1964 in view of section 138 and the General Clauses Act.

Analysis: Section 137, which contained the confidentiality bar and the restriction on court production, had been omitted with effect from 1 April 1964. The court held that the saving argument under section 6 of the General Clauses Act did not assist the objector for periods after that date. The notifications issued under section 138(2) were confined to banking companies and did not impose any general bar on disclosure in the present case. Section 138(1)(b) was treated as only an enabling provision for voluntary furnishing of information by the Commissioner and not as a restriction on a civil court's power to summon documents where no statutory prohibition subsisted.

Conclusion: The civil court was competent to summon and receive the income-tax records for the period after 1 April 1964, and the objection to their production failed.

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