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TMI Blog1968 (4) TMI 12X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... H. Barat, who was appointed as shebait under the orders of the Calcutta High Court made in 1936. The assessee owns several collieries and other business assets in the Dhanbad District of Bihar. Here, we are dealing with the assessment year 1961-62, for which the relevant accounting year was the financial year 1960-61. Hence, the law applicable will be the old Act, viz., Indian Income-tax Act, 1922 (here inafter referred to as the Act). The assessee claimed earned income relief ; but that claim was rejected both by the Income-tax Officer and the Appellate Assistant Commissioner, who thought that a deity, though a juristic person for assessment, was incapable of earning any income. The Income-tax Appellate Tribunal, however, granted earned ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... which is exempt from tax under sub-section (2) of section 14 or under a notification issued under section 60. " It is now well settled that, though a Hindu idol is a juristic person holding properties and the properties endowed vest in the same, neverth less the idol is the owner only in an ideal sense (see Deoki Nandan v. Murlidhar). In Mukherjea's Law of Endowment (second edition), at page 249, the legal position about the relationship between the idol and its shebait has been summed up as follows : " An idol is a juristic person in whom the title to the properties of the endowment vests. But it is only in an ideal sense that the idol is the owner. It has to act through human agency, and that agent is the shebait, who is, in law, th ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... cause its application is restricted only to those instances where the income of another person is included in the assessee's income under the provisions of the Act. Mr. Ugra Singh urged that the words " another person " in this portion of the definition must mean another distinct legal person other than the assessee. But, where the shebait acts merely for the idol, according to Mr. Ugra Singh, he cannot be said to be " another person " as mentioned in the inclusive part of the definition of " earned income ". There is, undoubtedly, considerable force in the contention of Mr. Ugra Singh. Reliance on section 41(1) of the Act may not be quite appropriate because, though it permits the levy and recovery of tax from a shebait in the same manne ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... and hence there is no difficulty in applying the principle of section 41(1) to them. In my opinion, the answer to the point raised by Mr. Ugra Singh is found in the Hindu Law concept of the relationship between the sheblit and the idol. The passage from Mukherjea's book (quoted above) says that the personality of the idol might, therefore, be said to be merged in that of the shebait. Hence, for all legal purposes, the shebait and the idol are one, and any income earned by the shebait not on his own personal behalf but while functioning as the shebait of the deity must be deemed to be the income earned by the idol. The separation of the personality of the shebait from that of the idol for the purpose of applying the provisions of the Act w ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X
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