1. DORAB PATEL, J.-The dispute in these six petitions for leave relate to assessment orders passed by the respondent against the late Mr. Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto (hereinafter referred to as the deceased) for the assessm ent years 1972--73 to 1977-78 and these assessments were recorded by notices under section 34, sections 23(4) and 24-B of the Income-tax Act (hereinafter called the said Act), except for the assessm ent year 1977-78, which was reopened only under section 23(4) read with section 24-B (3) of the said Act. As the deceased died on 4th April; 1979, all the assessment orders were passed after his death and were served together with notices of demand on the petitltioner (who is one of the two widows of the deceased) on 7th July, 1979. The total demand in these assessment orders is for a sum of Rs.34, 80,075 (herenafter called the amount). It was submitted by Mr. Mumtaz Hussain, as the petitioner was not aware of the proceedings taken against her late husband, she first applied for inspection and this request was partially allowed. She, the after, filed appeals against all the assessm ent orders before the Appellate Assistant Commissioner of Income-tax on 9-7-1979 and applied for a stay of the recovery of the said amount from her. But, as she did not receive any reply to her request, she filed writ petitions in the Lahore High Court against the respondent and a separate writ petition was filed for the demand for each assessment year. The respondent contested the writ petitions on merits and also submitted that they were not maintainable. However, the learned Judge, who heard the writ petitions, held that they were maintainable, but he dis--missed them on merits by a judgment dated 8th March 1980. Hence these petitions for leave. .
2. All the petitions turn, inter alia, on the proper construction of section 24-B of the said Act, and especially of subsection (3) of this section. This alone is a question of great legal importance and the judgment of the High Court is one of first impression: The petitions also raise other questions of and fact, and, further, one of the grievances of the petitioner is that some of the admissions of her learned counsel have not been examined and/or that the judgment erroneously states that these pleas were not pressed. We, therefore, grant leave as prayed. Security in the sum of Rs.1, 000 in each of the petitions. The appeals will be heard together and made ready on the present record with liberty to the parties to file additional documents.
3. We now turn to the question of stay, and Mr. Mumtaz Hussain submitted that there was no material in support of the orders of assessme nt. But, this is a question, which can be determined only when the appeals are beard learned counsel's next submission was that Estate Duty was always the first charge on the estate of a deceased, therefore, the demand for the said amount was illegal, as it was in contravention of the provisions of the Estate Duty Act. The argument cannot help the petitioner for the purposes of a stay, because the estate of the deceased might be sufficient to meet both his liability for income-tax and his other liabilities. And, on the other hand. In order to obtain an interim stay, the petitioner has to make out a very strong case, such as, for example, that the demand notices are patently illegal.
4. Mr. Mumtaz Hussain, therefore, read out these notices and said that they were a nullity, because they were addressed to the deceased. They read "Mr. Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, deceased, through Begum Nusrat Bhutto." A notice to a dead person is a nullity. That is elementary ; nor did Mr. Bilal attempt to explain how a nonce could be issued to a dead person. He, however, submitted that the demand notices should be treated as notices for the payments due by the deceased under section 29 of the said Act, because under this section when income tax is due, it can be recovered from the successors of dead person liable to pay such tax". And, as the petitioner is one of the two widows of the deceased, Mr. Bilal submitted that these notices had been served upon her in her capacity as a legal heir of the deceased.
5. The difficulty in the way of this submission is that it means reading into the demand notices what is not stated in them. Secondly, on the footing that the demands have been made on the petitioner in her capacity as one the two widows of the deceased, she would be liable only to a 1,/16th share B of the net estate of the deceased. But the demand made on her is for the entire liability of the deceased, and Mr. Bilal was not able to explain how the petitioner, who was entitled to a 1/16th share of the net estate of the deceased could be liable for his entire tax liability. Therefore, on this ground alone, the notices are prima facie, illegal. Additionally, on the footing that the notices were issued under section 29, this section has to be read with section 24-B, and as subsection (3) of this section does not exclude a right of hearing, it means that the petitioner should have been heard before the demand for the said amount was made on her and on this ground also, the demand notices are, prima facie, illegal We, therefore, observed that the better course for the. Respondent would be to withdraw these notices and institute fresh proceeding against the petitioner in accordance with the provisions of the said Act. Mr. Bilal only fell back on section 24-D, but he was unable to show how the respondent could, under this section, recover the whole of the said amount from the petitioner, and that without hearing her. We have, therefore, no option but to stay the recovery of the said amount pending the bearing of the appeal and we order accordingly. However, we direct that the appeals should be fixed for hearing as soon as they are ready, and in any case, not later than six months.
6. There--fore, we direct Mr. Mumtaz Hussain to file his concise statement within two months and to supply a copy forthwith to the respondent, and the respondent will file his concise statement within one month of the receipt of the concise statement of the appellant, and supply a copy of it to the appellant.