Satish Chandra, J. - (1.) THE U.P. State Warehousing Corporation has approached this court under article 226 of the Constitution with a prayer that the notice of demand dated 22nd May, 1973, issued by the Income-tax Officer, Lucknow, requiring the petitioner to pay a sum of Rs. 30,12,669 as advance tax for the assessment year 1974-75 be quashed and the respondents be directed not to recover any advance tax from the petitioner. THE petitioner alleges that in its assessments for the last several years it had been claiming exemption from income-tax in respect of its income from letting its warehouses, but this claim has been consistently rejected by the Income-tax Officer as well as the Appellate Assistant Commissioner and the matter is now pending in appeal before the Tribunal. It is hence futile to raise the same objection before the Income-tax Officer who has issued the impugned notice of demand. THE petitioner prays that the question of Jaw whether the petitioner is entitled to exemption under Section 10(29) of the Income-tax Act, 1961, be decided by this court.
(2.) SECTION 10(29) of the Act of 1961 provides: " 10. In computing the total income of a previous year of any person, any income falling within any of the following clauses shall not be included--. ..... (29) in the case of an authority constituted under any law for the time being in force for the marketing of commodities, any income derived from the letting of godowns or warehouses for storage, processing of facilitating the marketing of commodities. " Under this provision, an assessee would be entitled to exemption if- (1) it is an authority constituted under any law ; (2) it is an authority constituted for the marketing of commodities ; and (3) the exemptible income is in respect of letting of godowns or warehouses for storage, processing or facilitating the marketing of commodities. Section 28 of the Agricultural Produce (Development and Warehousing) Corporation Act, No, 28 of 1956, provided that the State Governments may, with the approval of the Central Warehousing Corporation, establish State Warehousing Corporations. Accordingly, the U. P. State Warehousing Corporation, the petitioner, was established by the State Government of V. on 19th March, 1958. The aforesaid 1956 Act was repealed and re-enacted as the Warehousing Corporations Act, 1962. Clause (g) of Section 43(2) of this Act provided that notwithstanding the repeal of the 1956 Act, a State Warehousing Corporation established for a State under the repealed Act shall be deemed to be the State Warehousing Corporation established for that State under this Act, It is thus evident that the petitioner was in law established under the 1962 Act.
(3.) THE next question is whether the petitioner is an " authority " within the meaning of Section 10(29). THE Income-tax Act does not define the term "authority". For the revenue it was submitted that under the circumstances the word "authority" should be understood in its dictionary meaning. Our attention was invited to the meaning of the word " authority " given in Webster's Third New International Dictionary that "authority" s a public administrative agency or corporation having quasi-governmental powers and authorised to administer revenue producing public enterprises. Learned counsel placed reliance upon the Supreme Court decision in Rajasthan State Electricity Board v. Mohan Lal, AIR 1967 SC 1857 to emphasise that in that case the Supreme Court has accepted this meaning of the word " authority" to understand the significance of the term " other authorities " occurring in article 12 of the Constitution. A look at the dictionary itself shows that the word " authority " has several connotations. Corpus Juris Secundum, volume 7, page 1291, defines the term " authority " to mean, inter alia, a body having jurisdiction in certain matters of public nature. This meaning does not import that the corporation' should have governmental powers. If the submission raised on behalf of the revenue that possession of quasi-governmental power is an essential ingredient of an " authority " be accepted, so as to exclude purely business enterprises, even though they may have been constituted by a statute, Section 10(29) would become redundant and mere surplusage. Section 10(29) applies to an authority constituted for the marketing of commodities. Evidently, such authority will specifically be a business enterprise. Ex hypothesi, the term " authority " as occurring in Section 10(29) cannot possibly be construed as referring to an authority having quasi-governmental powers.;