Walter Salis Schwabe, K.C., C.J.

1. The question for decision is whether an English company with sterling capital is liable to assessment under the heading " Tax on Companies " under the Madras City Municipal Act, IV of 1919. This depends on the proper interpretation of S. no and of Rule 7 of Schedule IV which must be read together. That section runs: " Every incorporated company transacting business within the City for profit...shall pay by way of licence fee ...a half-yearly tax on its paid-up capital on the scale shown in the taxation rules in Schedule IV but in no case exceeding rupees one thousand, if and as soon as it has transacted business in the city for the period prescribed in Section 113." Turning to Rule 7 of Schedule IV it runs: "Companies shall be assessed by the Commissioner on the following scale:

Paid-up capital--lakhs of rupees. Half-yearly tax. A. More than twenty ... ... Rs. 1,000. B. More than ten, less than twenty ... Rs. 500.

etcetera." This has been slightly amended by the Madras Act VII of 1922, which substituted " twenty and more than twenty" and " ten and more than ten " for the words under (A) and (B), the object being to bring in to tax companies