JUDGMENT :

(STATEMENT OF CASE)

This reference application is preferred by the department against the order passed by the Tribunal in I.T.A. No. 12788 of 1966-67 in which a question regarding the assessment of the income of the assessee for the assessment year 1962-63 arose.

2. The reference application is filed late by three days, but the explanation of the department is that the reference application was dispatched by registered post on August 9, 1968, but it could not reach the Tribunal's office at Bombay by August 14, 1968, because of the dislocation of the railway traffic caused by heavy floods at Broach and Surat in August, 1963. It may be mentioned that, if the application had reached the Tribunal's office on August 14, 1968, it would have been within time but since it has reached the Tribunal's office on August 17, 1968, it is late by three days. It is, however, clear that the department has dispatched the application through post quite in time and that it has reached the Tribunal's office late on account of circumstances which were beyond the control of the department. Under the circumstances, the delay in question is sufficiently explained and, therefore, the same is condoned