TaxTMI 
TaxTMI 
2000 (11) TMI 2
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....ther, on the facts and in the circumstances of the case, the Tribunal was right in holding that the profit arising from the sale of agricultural lands did not amount to capital gains within the meaning of the Income-tax Act, 1961 ?" The reference related to the assessment years 1981-82 and 1983-84. In the previous years relevant to the assessment years 1981-82 and 1983-84 the assessee sold agricultural lands which were situated within the municipal limits of Bina. He made capital gains thereon and the Income-tax Officer made him liable to capital gains tax. The first appellate authority agreed with the Income-tax Officer and the assessee approached the Tribunal. The Tribunal held that the profit on the sale of agricultural lands was not c....
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....ant "any rent or revenue derived from land which is used for agricultural purposes . . ." Section 2(4A) defined "capital asset" to mean "property of any kind held by an assessee" but not "any land from which the income derived is agricultural income". It was submitted by learned counsel for the assessee that "agricultural income" in clause (1) of article 366 must be read only as it was defined in 1950 when the Constitution came into force ; that is to say, in the manner indicated in sections 2(1)(a) and 2(4A)(iii) of the 1922 Act. To decide the correctness of the submission, it is necessary to give true meaning to clause (1) of article 366. "Agricultural income" thereunder means "agricultural income as defined for the purposes of the enact....
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....uction of a reference statute has been neatly summed up by Sutherland, thus : 'A statute which refers to the law of a subject generally adopts the law on the subject as of the time the law is invoked. This will include all the amendments and modifications of the law subsequent to the time the reference statute was enacted'. Corpus Juris Secundum also enunciates the same principle in these terms : 'Where the reference in an adopting statute is to the law generally which governs the particular subject, and not to any specific statute or part thereof, . . . the reference will be held to include the law as it stands at the time it is sought to be applied, with all the changes made from time to time, at least as far as the changes are consist....
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....ich the relevant figures have been published before the first day of the previous year ; or (b) in any area within such distance, not being more than eight kilometres. from the local limits of any municipality or cantonment board referred to in item (a), as the Central Government may, having regard to the extent of, and scope for, urbanisation of that area and other relevant considerations, specify in this behalf by notification in the Official Gazette;" It appears that by reason of the decision of the Bombay High Court in Manubhai A. Sheth v. N. D. Nirgudkar, Second ITO [1981] 128 ITR 87, an Explanation was added by the Finance Act, 1989, with effect from April 1, 1970, to clause (1A) of section 2 which read thus : "Explanation.--- For ....