P. Govindan Nair, J.

1. At the instance of the Controller of Estate Duty, Kerala, the Income-Tax Appellate Tribunal, Madras Bench acting under section 64 (1) of the Estate Duty Act, 1953, has referred the following question to this Court”

"Whether on the facts and in the circumstances of the case, the Appellate Tribunal was right in law in holding that the value of the entire properties mentioned in the partition deed of dated 6th December 1954 is not dutiable under section 10 of the Estate Duty Act."

2. The partition deed, dated 6th December 1954 is Annexure-A to the statement of the case and this partition deed was executed among the deceased, Shri Pachayappa Chettiar, and his two sons, Arunachalam Chettiar and Kandaswamy Chettiar. It is stated at the beginning of this document that the parties to the document were an undivided Hindu family and that they did not possess any coparcenary properties at the time of the execution of the partition deed. The properties dealt with under the partition deed, it is asserted in the document, were acquired with the joint labour and efforts of the father and his two sons. The only property with which we are concerned in this reference re