Circular No. 438

Section 5 l Levy of Estate Duty

What this is

Circular No. 438 was issued by the Central Board of Direct Taxes on 11 November 1985. Its subject is Section 5 l Levy of Estate Duty.

What it does

Records the States later added to Schedule I to the Estate Duty Act by notification under section 5(2), each having passed a resolution adopting the levy. The table gives the date of the adopting resolution and the notification by which the addition was made: Assam and Bihar, resolutions of 18 March 1954 and 15 March 1954, by SRO 1138 dated 7 April 1954; Travancore-Cochin, 19 March 1955, by SRO 904 dated 22 April 1955; Madras, 2 April 1955, by SRO 1227 dated 6 June 1955; Andhra Pradesh, 7 July 1955, by SRO 1877 dated 22 August 1955; Mysore, 18 October 1955, by SRO 3660 dated 9 December 1955; and the Patiala and East Punjab States Union, 10 April 1956, by SRO 966 dated 20 April 1956.

Why it was issued

Section 5(2) required a State to pass an adopting resolution before the duty on agricultural land extended to it, and the additions were then notified; the table collects those notifications in one place.

Who it reaches

Estate duty accountable persons in the States listed
Practitioners tracing when the levy extended to a particular State
Officers deciding an old estate duty assessment turning on situs of agricultural land

The provisions it speaks to

Left, the provision of the Income-tax Act, 1961 as the instrument itself names it. Right, the section of the Income-tax Act, 2025 that the department’s own concordance maps it to — which is where the same ground is now covered.

Under the 1961 Act	Now
s.5	s.5

The instrument, as the Board published it

The words below are the department’s own, reproduced from its published text. Where the department’s copy carried a publisher’s notes after the instrument, those are not reproduced.

SECTION 5 l LEVY OF ESTATE DUTY
1513. Adopting States subsequently added in Schedule I - Notification under sub-section (2)

State

Date of passing the adopting resolution

Notification

No.

Date

1. Assam

18-3-1954

SRO 1138

7-4-1954

2. Bihar

15-3-1954

SRO 1138

7-4-1954

3. Travancore-Cochin

19-3-1955

SRO 904

22-4-1955

4. Madras

2-4-1955

SRO 1227

6-6-1955

5. Andhra Pradesh

7-7-1955

SRO 1877

22-8-1955

6. Mysore

18-10-1955

SRO 3660

9-12-1955

7. Patiala and East Punjab States Union

10-4-1956

SRO 966

20-4-1956

What to watch

This is an Estate Duty matter, not a circular under the Income-tax Act, and the section 5 referred to is the estate duty charging section.
The entries name States by their pre-reorganisation designations, so a modern State may have to be traced back through those names.
Estate duty was abolished for deaths after the mid-1980s, so this bears only on deaths in the period when the levy ran.
The text supplied is a table with no accompanying narrative, so it settles dates and notification numbers and nothing more.

Where you meet it

An old estate duty assessment or a title dispute where it matters from which date the duty extended to a particular State.

On the same provision

Other instruments in this library that name the same provision of the 1961 Act. They are not necessarily still operative, and a later one may have replaced an earlier one without saying so.

Notification No. 13/2024 [F.No. C-14011/41/2018-V&L] / SO 312(E) — Ministry of Finance 19 January 2024
Notification No. 12/2024 [F.No. C-14011/46/2018-V&L] / SO 311(E) — Ministry of Finance 19 January 2024
Circular No. 22/2022 — Condonation of delay under section 119 2 b of the income tax act 1961 in filing of form no.10a 1 November 2022
Notification No. 93/2021 [F.No. 370142/34/2021-TPL(Part III)] / GSR 578(E) — Ministry of Finance 18 August 2021
Circular No. 3/2021 — Circular under section 10 of the direct tax vivad se vishwas act 2020 4 March 2021
Circular No. 21/2020 — Clarifications on provisions of the direct tax vivad se vishwas act 2020 4 December 2020

← Circular No. 441 · Circular No. 434 →

A circular binds the department, not you and not a court. The Board issues a circular to its own officers. An assessee may hold the department to a circular that helps him; the department cannot hold an assessee to one that hurts him, and the Tribunal and the courts decide the law for themselves.

Source: the Income Tax Department’s own published text — its page for this instrument.