Law:

Section:

Section 36 of the Estate Duty Act, 1953 - Principal value how to be estimated - Accountable person returned value of estate consisting of teak plantation left by deceased on basis of approved valuer's report - Appellate Controller held value given by approved valuer as reasonable - Tribunal discarded valuer's report and arrived at value far less than evidence produced by accountable person - No cogent and valid reasons were stated by Tribunal to discard valuer's report - Further valuation given by approved valuer and accepted by Appellate controller was not shown to be illegal or infirm - Whether on facts, it could be said that Tribunal had arrived at its conclusion arbitrarily and at its ipse dixit and, therefore, Tribunal was not justified in reducing value of teak plantation - Held, yes (Matter remanded back) FACTS 'K' died on 13-7-1968. Amongst others private forest lands were one of the assets left by the deceased. The deceased had converted 691 acres of said lands into teak plantations. The accountable person returned the value at Rs. 69,100. He got the teak plantation valued by an approved valuer who fixed the total value at Rs. 3,56,750. On the basis of the report of the Inspector, the Assistant Controller valued the take plantations at Rs. 24,67,500. On appeal, the Appellate Controller held that the valuation given by the approved valuer was reasonable. On cross appeals, the Tribunal held that the value of the plantation would amount to Rs. 16 lakhs and further stated that, in view of the Kerala Private Forest (Vesting and Assignment) Act, 1971, only 15 percent thereof, would be the value of the property, i.e., Rs. 2.4 lakhs. On reference: HELD The Tribunal had not stated any cogent or valid reason to discard the value's report. A report was filed by the accountable person himself to substantiate his plea. The valuation finally arrived at by the Appellate Tribunal was far less than the evidence produced by the accountable person himself. At one time, the accountable person himself proposed the value of the teak plantation at Rs. 9,18,580. Further, the Tribunal arbitrarily held that only 15 percent of Rs. 16 lakhs would be the value of the teak…

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