1980 (9) TMI 1
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....er partners including her husband and minor daughter. The assessee filed a return of income for the assessment year 1964-65 showing Rs. 4,754 as income from property and Rs. 4,748 as income from other sources. The assessee stated in the return under the column "Profits and gains of business and profession" against item (b) which required share in the profits of a registered firm to be shown "Please ascertain from the firms' files the Malabar Tile Works and Malabar Plywood Works". The assessee, however, did not show in the return the amount representing the shares of her husband and minor daughter in the firms of M/s. Malabar Tile Works and M/s. Malabar Plywood Works though they were clearly includible in computing the total income of the as....
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....nly if there was concealment of the "particulars of his income by the assessee" and the words "his income" referred only to the income of the assessee himself and not to the income of any other person which might be liable to be included in the income of the assessee by reason of s. 64, sub-s. (1), cls. (i) and (iii). The Tribunal, accordingly, held that the omission or failure of the assessee to disclose in her return the amounts representing the shares of her husband and minor daughter in the two firms as forming part of her income could not be visited with penalty under s. 271, sub-s. (1), cl. (c), and, in this view, the Tribunal allowed the appeal and set aside the order imposing penalty. This led to the filing of an application for a r....
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....particulars of "his income". The question is what is the scope and content of the words "his income" occurring in this penal provision. Do they refer only to the income of the assessee himself or do they also take in the income of others which is liable to be included in the computation of the total income of the assessee by reason of the relevant provisions of the Act, such as s. 64, sub-s. (1), cls. (i) and (iii)? The answer to this question obviously depends upon as to what is "his income" which the assessee is liable to disclose for the purpose of assessment, for, concealment can only be of that which, one is bound to disclose and yet fails to do so. Section 139 provides for filing of a return of income by an assessee and sub-s. (1) of ....
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....ch provision which provides for inclusion of the income of certain other persons in computing the total income of an assessee. Clauses (i) and (iii) of this sub-section provide that in computing the total income of an assessee there shall be included all such income as arises directly or indirectly to the spouse of such assessee from the partnership of the spouse in a firm carrying on a business in which such individual is a partner as also to a minor child of such assessee from the admission of the minor to the benefits of the partnership firm. It is clear from this provision that though the share of the spouse or minor child in the profits of a partnership firm in which the assessee is a partner is not the income of the assessee but is th....
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....ation on the assessee to disclose this income in the returns filed by her. This contention is also, in our opinion, fallacious and deserves to be rejected. It is true that the form of the return prescribed by r. 12, which was in force during the relevant assessment year did not contain any separate column for showing the income of the spouse and minor child liable to be included in the total income of the assessee, but it did contain a note stating that if the income of any other person is includible in the total income of the assessee under the provisions, inter alia, of s. 64, such income should also be shown in the return under the appropriate head. This note clearly required the assessee to show in the return under the appropriate head ....
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....binding upon us and where we find that a different view has been taken by a Bench of three judges of this court. It was held in this case that even if there were any printed instructions in the form of the return requiring the assessee to disclose the income received by his wife and minor child from a firm of which the assessee was a partner, there was, in the absence in the return of any head under which the income of the wife or minor child could be shown, no obligation on the assessee to disclose this item of income, and the assessee could not be deemed to have failed or omitted to disclose fully and truly all material facts necessary for his assessment within the meaning of s. 34(1)(a) of the Indian I.T. Act, 1922. With the greatest res....