TaxTMI 
TaxTMI 
2011 (5) TMI 490
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....he premises of the assessee company and also had discussion with the Director of the company Dr. Jitendra Prakash. After considering the various submissions of the assessee, the Assessing Officer came to the conclusion that the assessee is carrying on tissue culture methodology and by this process, some of the activities carried on by the assessee are non agriculture and, therefore, the entire income from the sale of plants cannot be termed as agricultural income. He, therefore, bifurcated the income into agricultural income and business income in the ratio of 70:30. 3. Aggrieved by the asst. order, the assessee preferred an appeal before the CIT(A) who confirmed the order of the AO that some of the activities of the assessee are non agricultural and, therefore, entire income cannot be held as agricultural income. However, he restricted the business income to 10% of the total income. Against the finding of the CIT(A) that the activities carried on by the assessee in its laboratories are non agricultural operations, the assessee is in appeal before us, while against restricting the business income to 10% as against 30% as held by the AO, the Revenue is in appeal before us. ....
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....furcation of the income was not proper and the CIT(A) has erroneously restricted the non agricultural income to 10%. He submitted that for giving such a relief, the CIT(A) has followed the decision of ITAT, Bangalore Bench in the case of M/s Namdhari Seeds Pvt. Ltd., though the decision is not applicable to the facts of the case before us. 7. The learned DR submitted that agriculture in its primary sense denotes the cultivation of the feild and is restricted to cultivation of the land in the strict sense of the term meaning thereby tilling of the land, sowing of seeds, planting and similar operations on the land. He submitted that without these operations being involved only the proceedings subsequent to the germination of plant, such as weeding, digging the soil around the growth, removal of undesirable undergrowth etc. will not amount to agricultural operations. For this proposition, he placed reliance upon the decision of the Hon'ble Supreme Court in the case of CIT Vs. Raja Benoy Kumar Sahas Roy, 32 ITR 446. He thus, prayed that the order of the AO be upheld. 8. The learned counsel for the assessee on the other hand reiterated the submissions made by the assesse....
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....ly employed by a cultivator or receiver of rent-in-kind to render the produce raised or received by him fit to be taken to market; or iii) The sale by a cultivator or receiver of rent-in-kind of the produce raised or received by him, in respect of which no process has been performed other than a process of the nature described in paragraph (ii) of this sub-clause; ---------------------------------" 12. From a literal reading of the above provision, the meaning that can be gathered is that the income has to be derived from land (emphasis given by us) by operation of agriculture. Thus, the emphasis is on the possession of land and the agriculture operations, if any, have to be carried out in the said land and income has to be derived from the produce of such land only. The ratio of decision of the Hon'ble Supreme Court in the case of CIT Vs. Raja Benoy Kumar Sahas Roy, 32 ITR 466, is that agriculture in its primary sense denotes the cultivation of the field and is restricted to cultivation of the land in the direct sense of the primary operations meaning thereby that tilling of the land, sowing of the seeds, planting and similar operations on the land are the basic op....
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....eds. 4) The re-generation of whole plants from plant cells that have been genetically modified. 5) The production of plants in sterile containers that allows them to be moved with greatly reduced chances of transmitting diseases, pests, and pathogens. 6) The production of plants from seeds that otherwise have very low chances of germinating and growing, i.e orchids and nepenthes. 7) To clean particular plant of viral and other infections and to quickly multiply these plants as 'cleaned stock' for horticulture and agriculture. The modern tissue culture is performed under aseptic conditions under filtered air. Living plant materials from the environment are naturally contaminated on their surfaces (and sometimes interiors) with microorganisms. So surface sterilization of starting materials in chemical solution is required. These plants are then placed on the surface of a solid culture medium, but are sometimes placed directly into a liquid medium, particularly when cell suspension cultures are desired. Solid and liquid media are generally composed of inorganic salts plus a few organic nutrients, vitamins and plant hormones. Solid media are prep....