P. CHAKRAVARTTI, C. J.

( 1 ) THIS case is a remnant of a Reference under Section 66 (1) of the Income-tax Act by which three questions were referred to this Court. Two of them were disposed of by an order of Lahiri, J. and myself, passed on 19-8-1954 but by the same order we called for a further Statement of Case with respect to the third question. That statement has since been received.

( 2 ) BROADLY stated, the third question asks whether the payments made by a company under Section 18a of the Income-tax Act can be treated as a part of its reserve till actually credit in respect of them is given in the regular assessment. It has arisen in the following way :

( 3 ) FOR the purposes of the Business Profits Tax Act, "taxable profits' means the amount by which the profits, during a chargeable accounting period, exceed the abatement allowable in respect of that period. That is laid down in Section 2 (17) of the Act. Under Section 2 (1) 'abatement' means a sum computed by a rather complicated process by reference to the capital of the company on the first day of the chargeable accounting period in accordance with Schedule II of the Act, but, as the Act originally stood, the provision

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