TMI Blog1954 (8) TMI 37X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... amely, 1945-46 and 1046-47. 3. One of the points raised by the assessee in the appeals appears to have been that its business was owned by a partnership and not by a Hindu undivided family. Necessarily, there was also an application for registration of the partnership under Section 26A, Income Tax Act. The Income Tax Officer held that before the assessee had made a partition within the meaning of Section 25A of the Act, the claim for the treatment of the business as a business owned by a firm could not be entertained and the claim for registration could not be allowed. The Income Tax Officer, who made that order was the Income Tax Officer, District III (2). Thereafter, the assessee preferred appeals to the Appellate Assistant Commissi ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... on of law and a question in the following terms was referred: Whether on the above facts and circumstances of this case the Appellate Tribunal was correct in holding that the officer competent to file the appeals was the Income Tax Officer, Non-Companies, E. P. T., to whom the case of the respondent had been transferred by the Commissioner of Income Tax, West Bengal, before the date of the filing of the appeals and not the Income Tax Officer, District III (2), Calcutta, who made the assessments and passed the order refusing registration of the respondent and who had been directed to appeal to the Appellate Tribunal under Section 33(2), Income Tax Act, by the said Commissioner of Income-tax? The Tribunal took the view that an appea ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... appeal was filed, it was the Income Tax Officer, Non-companies (Income-tax-cum-Excess Profits Tax) District, Calcutta, who was still in seisin of the case and the assessment file had not been re-transferred to the Income Tax Officer, District III(2). Mr. Meyer himself conceded subsequently that such indeed was the position. 5. On the above facts, the question is whether the Commissioner of Income Tax was entitled to direct the Income Tax Officer, District III(2), to prefer the appeal and whether the appeal preferred by that Officer under such direction was competent. Mr. Meyer referred to the definition of 'Income-tax Officer' as given in the Act, but I do not see that the definition leads anybody anywhere. The provision under wh ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... Tax Officers, no objection could have been taken to the order made by the Commissioner of Income Tax in the present case, subject to what Section 33(2) means, It appears, however, that while the Act has provided that the Income Tax Officers shall perform their functions in respect of such persons or classes of persons or of such incomes or classes of income or in respect of such areas as the Commissioner of Income Tax may direct, it has not provided that the Commissioner of Income Tax can also direct an Income Tax Officer to perform only some of the functions in respect of a particular person or classes of persons or some particular person's income or classes of income and direct at the same time one or more other Income Tax Officers ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... ssment of the same assessee as between different Income Tax Officers, asking one Officer to proceed with his assessment and asking another to take appeals before the Appellate Tribunal. 7. In my opinion, even apart from the true meaning of Section 33(2), the view taken by the Tribunal is in complete accordance with what appears to me to be the true intention of the Act. 8. Mr. Meyer submitted that unless such power were conceded to the Commissioner of Income Tax, great inconvenience might often result where the exigencies of an assessment case required its transfer to a particular Income Tax Officer. Considerations of convenience are hardly relevant when we are to interpret the Act, but I may observe that, in the present case at least ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X
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