The petitioner, 82-year-old Kunnur Seenivasan, a member of the Assets Protection Council of DMK, said that a portion of the Finance Act, 2022, that requires individuals with an annual income of more than ₹2.5 lakh to pay income tax, is “ultra vires”.
A bench of Justices R Mahadevan and Sathya Narayana Prasad issued notices to the Central government, and the Law and Finance ministries and directed them to respond within four weeks.
The petitioner told the court that the income tax slabs as per the current Finance Act were in conflict with the Centre’s own findings since, it has clearly said that families with gross annual income upto ₹7,99,000 are eligible for availing benefits under the reservation for the Economically Weaker Section (EWS) category.
The petitioner said that the current tax slab, therefore, was in conflict with the EWS category cap on annual income. He also said that the concerned section of the Act, “Paragraph A in Part-I of First Schedule of the Finance Act, 2022,” through which the government fixed the above tax slab, was in violation of Articles 14, 15, 16, 21, 265 of the Constitution of India.
“When the government fixed income criteria that a family having gross income up to the limit of Rs 7,99,999 is an economically weaker family for availing benefits under Economically Weaker Section (EWS) reservation, the government should not be permitted to collect income tax from individuals having income upto limit of Rs 7,99,999 as there is no rationality and equality in it,” the plea said.
Source: Barandbench
