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Showing contexts for: shebait in Commissioner Of Income-Tax, Gujarat-V vs Girdharram Hariram Bhagat on 15 October, 1983Matching Fragments
1. The Tribunal committed grave error of law in finding that the offerings at the feet of Jalarambapa cannot be treated as income of the assessee earned by him through his activities of founding, maintaining and improving the institution known as "Jalaram Guddee".
2. Alternatively, it was contended that the Tribunal committee a serious error of law in finding that the institution of Jalaram Guddee is not a temple. The Tribunal ought to have held on the facts and in the circumstances of the case that it was a temple founded in the sacred memory of saint Jalaram. As such it is a public/private religious endowment and the assessee being admittedly the manager is in a position of shebait having beneficial interest in the income of the institution, and the surplus which he appropriates is the income of the assessee.
3. On the basis that it is a shrine dedicated to the sacred memory of the saint, the property vests in the shrine and the assessee being admittedly a manager, is in the position of a shebait having beneficial interest in the income of the institution and the surplus which he appropriates is the income of the assessee.
4. On the basis that it is in a shrine dedicated to the sacred memory of the saint which is a private religious endowment and its property vests of the assessee being a descedent of the founder, its income from the source of shrine subject to the purpose of endowment must be held to be that of the assessee.
29. Re : Contention No. 2 :
30. The learned counsel for the Revenue, therefore, alternatively urged that the Tribunal fell into an error of law in finding that the institution of Shri Jalarambapa was not a temple. In the submission of the learned counsel for the Revenue, the Tribunal ought to have held that it was a temple or in any case a sansthan founded in the sacred memory of saint Jalarambapa, and having regard to the uninterrupted visits and use by the members of the public without any discrimination, it was a public religions endowment, and the assessee being admittedly the manager is in a position of a shebait who has a beneficial interest in the income of the institution and the admitted fact that the assessee was retaining and using the surplus income for his personal purposes, the ITO was perfectly justified in treating this surplus as income of the assessee, he being the beneficial owner thereof. The learned counsel for the Revenue cited a number of decisions of the Supreme Court as well as of other courts in support of this contention. We will refer to these citations at the appropriate time in the course of our discussion. On behalf of the assessee, this contention is sought to be repelled by the learned Advocate-General by urging that the entire contention of the Revenue proceeds on certain assumptions which are not warranted on the facts and in the circumstances of the case. In the first place, he submitted that no material has been placed on the record to establish that there was any consecration of the saint's portrait to justify this submission that the institution of Jalaram Guddee was in the nature of temple. Secondly, he urged that there is no evidence whatsoever on the record of the case to show that there was any dedication of the property to the so-called temple or the a sansthan as claimed by the Revenue. It is also not established, according to the learned Advocate-General, as to what was the extent of the interest of the assessee, assuming without admitting that he was occupying a position akin to that of a shebait. Merely because the assessee had a domain or control over the collection of the offerings or for that matter, he was using the surplus for his personal purposes would not be sufficient to establish the extent of the beneficial interest which depends up on the custom of the institution. It is in the backdrop of these revial contentions that we have to determine as to whether the learned counsel for the Revenue was right in urging the contention as he did.
37. The latter part of the contention is also, in our opinion, ill-conceived. The latter part of the contention, as a matter of fact, flows from the earlier part of the contention. The contention is that the assessee being admittedly in a position of a manager is occupying a position akin to that of a shebait and, therefore, he has a beneficial interest in the income derived from the collections of the offerings made at the feet of Shri Jalarambapa. What is the position of a shebait, and whether he has any beneficial interest in the offerings or the receipts of a Hindu religious endowment, has been elaborately discussed by the Privy Council in the leading decision of Vidya Varuthi Thirtha v. Balusami Ayyar, 48 IA 302; AIR 1922 PC 123. It is not necessary to refer in detail to this decision. Suffice it to quote the passage which has very succinctly summed up the position of Hindu religious institutions and their managers. Justice Ameer Ali, speaking for the Judicial Committee, summed up the position at page 331 as under (p. 126 of AIR 1922 PC) :