The court clarified that for the purposes of section 25A (1) of the Indian Income-tax Act, a partition of the entire joint family property is necessary.

( 1 ) THIS reference under section 66 (1) of the Indian Income-tax Act arises out of a claim made by the assessee for an order under section 25a (1) of the Act in the course of the assessment proceedings for the year 1953-54. Admittedly, the assessee was being assessed as a Hindu undivided family up to the assessment year 1952-53. The assessment for the year 1952-53 was completed on February 25, 1957. On the 6th of December, 1957, the assessee made the application referred to above under section 25a (1) claiming that by virtue of an agreement dated the 27th of March, 1953, and a declaration made before the Magistrate on the 1st of April, 1953, the joint family property has been partitioned among the members in definite portions and that, therefore, they were entitled to ask for an order from the Income-tax Officer recording that fact. The officer having refused to make an order as asked for and his refusal having been confirmed both by the Appellate Assistant Commissioner and the Income-tax Appellate Tribunal, the assessee moved the Tribunal to state a case and refer to this court certain questions of law said to arise out of the order of the Tribunal in the matter. According to the assessee's application before the Tribunal, the questions that arose were -

" (1) Whether the Income-tax Appellate Tribunal was justified in law in holding that section 25a of the Income-tax Act requires the actual division by metes and bounds of the joint family property and that the entire family property must be divided; and (2) In the circumstances of the case, whether the Income-tax Officer was justified in law in not making an order under section 25a of the Act. "

( 2 ) THE Tribunal agreeing that the question of law did arise, has referred to this court the following question :

"whether section 25a (1) of the Indian Income-tax Act, 1922, requires the actual division by metes and bounds of all the joint family property. "

( 3 ) THE admitted facts are that the assessee family consisted of only two members, father and son, carrying on certain business and owning certain immovable and movable properties. On the 27th of March, 1953, they entered into an agreement which is annexure "a" to the Tribunal's statement of facts produced before this court. Though the agreement covers 12 paragraphs, the substance thereof is that the parties agreed to be divided in status and interest on and with effect from the 1st of April, 1953; they further agreed to divide all their movable properties on and with effect from the same date, the shares being one-fourth to the father and three-fourth to the son; so far as the immovable properties are concerned, they merely declared the shares to be the same as stated above and agreed to divide them in the said proportion sometime after the 1st of April, 1953, the reasons for the agreed postponement being that the parties considered it more convenient to complete the assessment of the family both in respect of income-tax and sales tax for the period ending 31st of March, 1953, and also that as one of the houses was intended to be demolished and rebuilt, the parties may, according to their desire and convenience, so arrange partition as to permit one of them to retain the property by paying cash value in respect of the agreed share of the other.

( 4 ) THE declaration before the Magistrate on the 1st of April, 1953, does not do anything more than record that each of them wanted to be divided in status from the other and intimated his intention so to do to the other and that they are divided from each other as from that date, viz. , the 1st of April, 1953. The last sentence in the declaration is

"we have divided all our movables and we will divide immovables hereafter. "

( 5 ) THE actual position, therefore, was that there had been a disruption in status between the members of the family, there was a complete partition or division in respect of movables, but in respect of immovable properties there was only a