9911796707
TMI Blog1960 (6) TMI 19X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... on before the Board of Revenue against an order made by the Commercial Tax Officer affirmed on appeal by the prescribed authority and on revision by the Commissioner. The application before the Board of Revenue was under section 20(3) of the Act. On 26th September, 1958, the Board of Revenue dismissed the assessee's application and the order of the Board of Revenue was communicated to the assessee on 14th October, 1958. The terms of the letter by which the order of the Board of Revenue was communicated to the assessee are as follows: "The above petitions have been rejected by the Board. The Board's orders dated 26th September, 1958, passed in the matter are open to inspection on any day during office hours." It is admitted that this lette ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... not expressly excluded by the special or local law. There is nothing in the Bengal Finance (Sales Tax) Act of 1941 to exclude the operation of the whole or any part of section 12 of the Indian Limitation Act. Accordingly, section 12 is certainly attracted to a proceeding under the Bengal Finance (Sales Tax) Act. But the difficulty of applying section 12(2) to a proceeding like the present one is that the operation of section 12(2) is limited to an appeal, an application for leave to appeal, and an application for a review of judgment. The application filed by the assessee before the Board of Revenue under section 21(1) of the Bengal Finance (Sales Tax) Act, 1941, does not come under any of the categories mentioned in section 12(2) of the I ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... nor an application for review of judgment. So far as this Court is concerned Bose, J., has followed the Full Bench decision of the Allahabad High Court, in preference to the decision of Chatterjee, J., in the case of India Ice Cold Storage Co. Ltd. v. The Member, Board of Revenue, West Bengal[1948] 1 S.T.C. 191; 53 C.W.N. 191., in an unreported judgment in the case of Calcutta Cloth Agency v. S. Banerjee Civil Revision 2142 of 1955 decided on 3rd April, 1957. I agree with the view taken by Bose, J., in the aforesaid case as to the scope of section 29 read with section 12(2) of the Indian Limitation Act. I accordingly hold that the petitioner is not entitled to exclude the time taken for obtaining a certified copy of the order of the Boa ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... tion of the entire contents of the order which has been passed. In support of this proposition reliance has been placed upon a decision of the Nagpur High Court in the case of Govindji Murarji v. Commissioner of Sales Tax, Madhya Pradesh, Nagpur[1955] 6 S.T.C. 183; A.I.R. 1955 Nag. 113. In that case the order sought to be challenged was passed by the Revenue authorities without notice to the parties and the question that was raised was that the period of limitation does not begin to run until the order is actually communicated to the assessee. Their Lordships held that for the purposes of limitation the order was passed when a copy of it was received by the assessee. The notice of the order in that case was to the effect that the applicatio ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... from the date when the party affected by the order had a reasonable opportunity of knowing what it contained. Applying this test to the facts of the present case, it appears to me that the notice which was served by the Board of Revenue upon the assessee in the present case is equivalent to pronouncement of the order in open Court. It states that the Board of Revenue had dismissed the assessee's application and informs the assessee that he was at liberty to inspect the order on any day during office hours. This notice, in my opinion, gives the assessee a reasonable opportunity of ascertaining the contents of the order that was made by the Board of Revenue. The communication in the present case, in express terms gives the assessee an opport ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X
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