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TMI Blog1960 (1) TMI 35X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... right in allowing the whole of the depreciation claimed by the assessee with reference to one item of machinery, referred to as the pulper? The first of these questions we have to answer against the petitioner and in favour of the assessee in view of our decision in T.C. No. 32 of 1957, etc., in which we have just delivered judgment. The payment of bonus was not to a "worker" as defined by Central Act LXIX of 1951, and so fell outside the scope of section 5(1). As it was however a payment made to an employee, and as it satisfied the test of section 5(e), that it was an expenditure wholly and exclusively laid out for the purpose of land or plantation, the Tribunal was right in allowing this claim of the assessee for deduction. T ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... on. Whether under those conditions, the assessee was entitled to the whole of the depreciation allowance or whether only to a proportionate part of the depreciation allowance is the question for determination. The Tribunal held that the proviso did not justify the claim being reduced proportionately on the basis that, though the pulper was available for work all through the season, it was actually used for a portion of the year. As the Tribunal pointed out, the provision to rule 4(3) has apparently been framed on the model of the rules regulating the computation of depreciation allowances under the Income-tax Act. The rule itself has not been elegantly framed and in trying to include within the scope of the proviso to rule 4(3) more than o ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... t rice the depreciation allowance with reference to the time factor, that is, with reference to the working season in relation to the year. The test really should be, in the case of seasonal factories, whether the machinery was available for use and for the whole use of agricultural purposes right through the working season. If that condition were to be satisfied, we see nothing in the rule or in the proviso thereto to disentitled the assessee to the whole of the depreciation allowance for that year, though the machinery could have been used only for a portion of the year, that is, during the working season. A very literal interpretation of the proviso would lead even to this absurdity. Obviously, the machinery could not be used all day and ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... n the case of a factory which had only a working season, the position would be more or less the same, that is, the machinery was available only for a portion of the working season. We are not attempting to exhaust the classes of cases to which the second limb of the proviso to rule 4(3) would apply. We refer to these only by way of examples. But, as we understand the proviso to rule 4(3), there is no scope for working out proportionately on the basis of the time factor, where in the case of a seasonal factory the machinery was available for use throughout the working season, in which case the assessee would be entitled to the whole of the depreciation allowance permissible for the year under section 5(f). That test was obviously satisfied i ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X
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