Manik Lal Ghose vs Officer-in-Charge of Hooghly-Chinsurah Municipality

Renupada Mukherjee, J.—This is an appeal by some of the ratepayers of a holding within Hooghly-Chinsurah Municipality against whom a suit for recovery of arrears of taxes and rates to the extent of Rs. 507-12-9 was brought by the commissioners of Hooghly-Chinsurah Municipality. The municipality is now represented by the officer-in-charge. The rates and taxes claimed from the Defendants of the trial court related to the period commencing from the first quarter of 1940-41 to the last quarter of 1947-48.

Various defences were taken by the contesting Defendants but the only defence with which I am concerned in this appeal is that the rates and taxes prior to the year 1946-47 were assessed illegally by the municipality and are not, therefore, recoverable by a suit. This defence of the contesting Defendants was upheld by the trial court which passed a decree for a sum of Rs. 96 only representing the amount of taxes for the years 1946-47 to 1947-1948. A charge was also declared upon the holding in arrear u/s 167 of the Bengal Municipal Act. An appeal was preferred from the judgment and decree of the trial court on behalf of the municipality. The appeal succeeded and the lower appellate court reversed the decree of the trial court and decreed the claim of the Plaintiff municipality in full.

This second appeal has been preferred by Defendants Nos. 1 to 3 of the trial court from the above judgment and decree passed by the lower appellate court.

A very short question of law has arisen for my decision in this appeal. The claim of the Respondent municipality for recovery of arrears of taxes and rates for the disputed holding related to the years commencing from the first quarter of 1940-41 to the last quarter of 1947-48. The claim for this period is connected with three general quinquennial assessments made u/s 137(1) of the Bengal Municipal Act, 1932. Admittedly, the first general valuation was made in 1936-37, the second in 1941-42 and the third and last in 1946-47. The legality of the assessment made during the last mentioned quinquennial valuation on the basis of which a partial decree was passed by the trial court was not questioned before me by Mr. Mukherjee who appeared on behalf of the Appellants. The only contention raised by Mr. Mukherjee in this Court was that the assessments made during the two earlier general re-valuations were illegal and without jurisdiction and so the claim of the Respondent municipality in so far as it is founded on those assessments must be declared to be void. This contention of Mr. Mukherjee has arisen in the following way.

It is an admitted fact that the arrears of rates and taxes which have been sought to be realised by the Respondent municipality relate to one undivided holding as denned in Clause (21) of Section 3 of the Bengal Municipal Act, 1932.

The definition runs in the following terms:

Holding means land held under one title or agreement and surrounded by one set of boundaries.

Mr. Mukherjee contended that although the disputed holding comprises one single holding as defined in the Bengal Municipal Act, the municipal commissioners apportioned the valuation of the holding as also the assessment amongst three different sets of co-sharers during the general valuations of 1936-37 and 1941-42 without any authority or without being requested in that behalf by the different co-sharers of the holding. In this connection reference may usefully be made to the Assessment Registers of the disputed holding which were marked ext. 2 and ext. 2(a) in the trial court. Exhibit 2 is a copy of the Assessment Register of Hooghly-Chinsurah Municipality for 1936-37 and ext. 2(a) is a copy of the Assessment Register of the same Municipality for 1941-42. It would appear from those papers that although the holding was recorded as one undivided holding the valuations as also the consequential assessments were distributed amongst three different sets of co-sharers presumably in proportion to the extent of their respective shares in the disputed holding. Mr. Mukherjee submitted on behalf of the Appellants that it was not permissible for the municipality to apportion or to distribute the valuation or assessment in this way and the only section in the Bengal Municipal Act, 1932, which authorises the municipality to subdivide a holding into separate shares is Section 130. That section requires that a subdivision of a holding can be made by the commissioners only on the application of any of the co-owners and after giving the other co-owners an opportunity to be heard. Mr. Mukherjee contended that there is no material in the present case to show that the procedure laid down in Section 130 was followed. In my opinion the provision of Section 130 of the Bengal Municipal Act, 1932, has no application to the facts of the present case. That section contemplates cases of subdivision at the instance of one or more co-sharers of a particular holding during the currency of the period of a general valuation. In this particular case there was no subdivision of the holding in the proper sense of the term. The holding was recorded in the Assessment Register as one single integral holding. The valuation of the entire holding was also given at one single figure, namely, at Rs. 420 during the valuation of 1936-37 and at Rs. 315 during the valuation of 1941-42. These facts clearly show that there was no subdivision of the holding at all, but the rates and taxes were distributed amongst "three different sets of co-sharere apparently for their convenience. In my opinion no illegality was committed by the commissioners of Hooghly-Chinsurah Municipality in distributing the rates and taxes amongst the different sets of co-sharers in this particular way.

In this connection I may mention that one of the Appellants, namely, Appellant Tulsi Charan Ghose, was a commissioner of the municipality during the relevant time. Neither he nor any other co-sharer of the holding took any steps for reviewing the valuation or assessment of the holding as made during the two general valuations mentioned above. Certainly the municipality had no ulterior purpose of its own in distributing the rates and taxes amongst the different co-sharers in the above manner. It may fairly be presumed that this was done with their knowledge and consent. I have already indicated that Section 130 of the Act contemplates a case of subdivision of a municipal holding at the instance of a co-owner or some co-owners during the currency of the period of a general valuation. Where, however, a municipality merely distributes the rates and taxes amongst several sets of co-owners of a holding for the purpose of convenience of payment by the co-owners, but at the same time keeps the holding intact by giving it one number and by valuing it at a single figure, the case should not be regarded as a subdivision of the holding within the meaning of Section 130 of the Bengal Municipal Act, 1932. A co-sharer Assessee who may have any objection to such distribution is entitled to take steps u/s 148 of the Act to have his grievances redressed. If that is not done the municipality will have the right to recover arrears of rates and taxes so fixed and distributed amongst the different sets of co-sharers of a particular holding.

In view of the foregoing observations I am of opinion that the contention raised by Mr. Mukherjee in this appeal is without any substance and it must fail. The appeal is accordingly dismissed with costs to the Respondent municipality.

Three months'' time is allowed as a period of grace from this date for paying up the decretal amount.