Bhagwati, J. - (1.) These four appeals with Special Leave granted by this Court under Article 136 of the Constitution are directed against the orders, dated the 8th June 1951, of the Income-tax Appellate Tribunal, Bombay A in Reference Applications Nos. 737, 738, 739 and 740 of 1949-50 and arise under the following circumstances:-
(2.) The appellants were at all material times a Hindu undivided family of which Rameshwarlal Ganeriwalla is the Karta. As a result of certain transactions which need not be detailed here Rameshwarlal Ganeriwalla became the creditor of the Nawab Bahadur of Murshidabad in a large sum of over Rs. 6,38,000 by about 1928-29. Sometime in 1933, an Act named Murshidabad Estate Administration Act, 1933 (Act XXIII of 1933) was enacted under the provisions whereof the Estate of the Nawab Bahadur was taken over by the authorized Manager. The debt due by the Nawab Bahadur to Rameshwarlal Ganeriwalla was admitted by the Board of Revenue in a sum of Rs. 5,42,173 as on 1st April 1934 and the Manager from time to time made payments by way of dividends to the appellants indicating in the covering letters how the payments were to be appropriated. The appellants for the assessment years 1938-39 to 1941-42 submitted income-tax returns in the first of which they did not mention any part of the money which they had received from the Manager and in the rest of which they mentioned certain amounts as having been received by them. When the Income Tax Officer discovered that certain money had been received by the appellants from the Manager he issued a notice under section 34 of the Income Tax Act in regard to the assessment year 1938-39. When these income-tax returns were considered by the I. T. O. he came to the conclusion that certain sums had been received by the appellants from the Manager by way of interest which were liable to assessment and he accordingly included those sums in the assessment orders which he passed for those several years. These assessment orders were passed by the Income Tax Officer on the respective dates, the 20th March 1943, 31st March 1944, 30th November 1944 and 31st October 1945. The appellants preferred appeals against these orders, being Income-tax Appeals Nos. 2/CC. II/43-44, Income-tax Appeals Nos. 8 and 22/CC-II/44-45 and Income-Tax Appeal No. 13/CC-II/45-46 and the Appellate Assistant Commissioner by his order, dated 13th June 1947 and 18th July 1947 disposed of all these four appeals confirming the orders which had been passed by the I. T. O. The appellants carried further appeals against these orders of the Appellate Assistant Commissioner to the Income Tax Appellate Tribunal being Appeals Nos. 1896, 1895, 1897 and 1898 of 1947-48. The Income Tax Appellate Tribunal by its order dated 3rd December 1949 dismissed Income Tax Appeal No. 1895 of 1947. Income Tax Appeal No. 1896 of 1947-48 was dismissed on the 7th November 1949 and the two other appeals, being Income-tax Appeals Nos. 1897 and 1898 of 1947-48, were also dismissed on the 3rd December 1949.
(3.) The appellants thereafter applied to the Income Tax Appellate Tribunal under section 66 (1) of the Income Tax Act requiring the said Tribunal to state cases and refer certain questions of law to the High Court at Calcutta, for its opinion. These applications were registered as Reference Applications Nos. 737 to 740 of 1949-50. These applications were dismissed by the Income Tax Appellate Tribunal by its order dated 8th June 1951.;