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1. There is an ancient temple of Ambaji Mata at Surat which was originally founded by a person named Premji Bhatt. He managed the temple, attended to the adornment of the deity and the performance of the puja and allowed the members of the public to visit the temple and to have darshan of the deity. Whatever offerings were made to the deity by the people visiting the temple were collected by him and retained by him as his income. In course of time, the temple passed to his descendants by inheritance and during the account years ended 31st March 1950, to 31st March, 1957, being the previous years for the assessment years 1950-51 to 1957-58, the following five persons who are assessees before us claimed to be the owner of the temple in the following share :

"Whether the Tribunal erred in law in declining to consider the contention of the applicants that as the income of the Ambaji Temple was the income of a public religious trust, the same was no assessable in the hands of the applicants in their individual capacities at all, either as an association of persons or otherwise, only on the ground that the applicants had not preferred any appeal from the refusal of the Appellate Assistant Commissioner to entertain their contention as an additional ground"