1987 (12) TMI 10

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..... assessee sold about 240 items of silverware, including dinner plates of different sizes, goblets of different kinds, finger bowls, jugs and the like for a sum of Rs. 1,64,340. These articles had been purchased by her years earlier and their cost of acquisition in J 961 was determined by the Income-tax Officer at Rs. 29,880. The difference in value was treated by the Officer as long-term capital gains. The assessee's claim that they were personal effects and were, therefore, excluded from the definition of "capital asset " under section 2(14) of the Income-tax Act, 1961, was rejected by the Officer. This finding was confirmed by the Commissioner of Incometax (Appeals). The Tribunal, on further appeal by the assessee, accepted the contention .....

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..... rial significance....... They may have to be used only when the occasion requires the use of such large number of articles at the same time........ The only way those articles could be put to use would be on occasions when there is a large gathering like feasts and so on. " (emphasis supplied) These are the facts found by the Tribunal. The question referred to us at the instance of the Revenue contains no challenge against these findings of fact. Counsel for the Revenue, however, submits that the Tribunal has misdirected itself as to the legal principle laid down by the Supreme Court in deciding what is a personal effect. In H. H. Maharaja Rana Hemant Singhji v. CIT [1976] 103 ITR 61 (SC), the Supreme Court referred to personal effects .....

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..... asions " every year. The Tribunal's reference to " various occasions " implies that these articles were not only " capable of being intended for personal or household use ", but were " normally, commonly or ordinarily intended " for such use, and were in fact so used on those occasions. On what evidence the Tribunal came to that conclusion, we do not know. Whether the Tribunal was justified in drawing that inference merely because the assessee's representative stated so, and whether that finding was perverse for want of reasonably acceptable evidence, is a matter on which we cannot express any view in the absence of a specific challenge. In the circumstances, the question must necessarily be answered, as we do, in the affirmative, that is, .....

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