Judgement

GROVER, J.: The common question which arises in these appeals by certificate, is whether speculative losses can be set off against profits from any other business activity under S. 10 in spite of the first proviso to S. 24 (1) of the Income-tax Act, 1922.

2. The facts in C. A. 1761/67 in which the question in the above form was referred, the language of the question being somewhat different in the other appeal, may be stated. The assessee who is an individual derived income from three sources i.e. property, shares in joint stock companies an commission agency business and shares in partnership firms. The accounting year relevant to the assessment year 1953-54 was the period from October 20, 1951 to October 8, 1952. In the personal business of commission agency, the assessee returned a net profit Rs. 2761/-. In arriving at this figure the net share of loss of Rs. 11,075/- from the firm of Kamta Prasad Raghunath Prasad in which the assessee was a partner, was claimed. The Income-tax officer did not go into the details but ignored the figure in the absence of information from the Income-tax Officer assessing the aforesaid firm. Before the Appellate Assistant Commissioner it w