( 1 ) THIS is an application under Article 226 of the Constitution by Messrs. Seth Sukhlall Chandanmull, described as a Hindu undivided family governed by Mitakshara School of Hindu Law, and of which Indra Kumar Karnani is pleaded AS the Karta. In this application the petitioner asks for a Writ of Certiorari upon the Income-tax Officer, Companies District II, Calcutta, and the Union of India, represented by the Commissioner of Income-lux to quash the assessment proceedings.

( 2 ) THE Income-tax Officer by his order dated 17-2-1956 assessed the income at Rs. 1,59,248/-, and it is alleged that he ignored the claim of the petitioner for the sum of Rs. 4,000/- as deductible allowance for earned income and disallowed a sum of Rs. 26,195-0-0 which was interest supposed to have been paid to Karnani Industrial Bank Ltd. , for the overdraft taken by the petitioner from the Rank against security of property and that he is also supposed to have disallowed bad debts claimed by the petitioner as permissible deduction.

( 3 ) THE main complaint of the petitioner is that in determining the sum payable by him on the basis of the assessment made, the Income-tax Officer applied the different rates of income-tax, surcharge and super-tax prescribed by the Finance Act of 1951 as applicable to the Finance Act, 1954 for the said assessment year. Dr. Pal appearing for the appellant has challenged the validity of progressive and graduated system of tax. His argument is that a progressive and graduated system of tax is unconstitutional. He has pressed no other point before me, and he has rightly and wisely not gone into disputed questions of fact.

( 4 ) DR. Pal formulates his point in this way. According to him, under the Scheme of the Finance Acts, no income-tax shall be payable on a total income, which, before deduction of the allowance, if any, does not exceed the statutory exempted limit which is prescribed differently in different years. He contends that although the Indian Income-tax Acts levy taxes on all incomes of individuals, the annual Finance Acts charge different rates of income-tax, sur-tax and super-tax on the persons liable to be assessed under the Indian Income-tax Act differently and at rates varying in different years. His argument is that the Finance Acts, in so far as they impose different rates of tax upon the income of different persons, make an unreasonable classification between different persons and as such infringe the fundamental rights of the petitioner guaranteed by Article 14 of the Constitution. He also contends that in so far as the Finance Acts imposed different rates of taxes upon the income of the same person varying in different years, they are an arbitrary imposition of tax without any reasonable basis or classification and as such in violation of Article 14 of the Constitution. A perusal of the grounds of objection summarised in paragraph 25 of the petition makes it clear that this is the only point of complaint.

( 5 ) IN support of his contention Dr. Pal relied on the article of Hackett in 25 Yale L. J. 427 under the title "the constitutionality of the graduated Income-tax Law". It is said there by the author that the constitutional power to levy a tax upon incomes of larger amounts a higher rate of tax than upon smaller incomes, is a question of very grave importance and that the additional income tax provided by the American Tariff Act of 1913 known as Surtax was in the opinion of a great many American lawyers in violation of the principle of equality which required that all taxable income, so far as the amount was concerned, should be treated alike.

( 6 ) HE also relied on the observations of Willoughby on the Constitution of the United States, 2nd Edition, Vol. 3, Article 1282, where the learned author comments that State inheritance tax laws of the United States have been attacked on the ground of violating the requirements of equality and uniformity, because of their progressive features, and because of

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