THE Vodafone case has attracted international attention and some strange (to say the least) reporting. This is how the International Tax Review reported,
Strong legal arguments were not the only thing on Vodafone's side in their triumph at the Indian Supreme Court; statistics show that a victory was inevitable. The judgment from Chief Justice SH Kapadia was just the latest tax decision he has made that favoured the taxpayer. As the table shows, over the past four years Kapadia has found 76% of tax cases in favour of the taxpayer. This is by far and above the percentages of his colleagues.
Income tax judgments passed by Supreme Court judges*
Name of Supreme Court judge
Assessee
Revenue
Assessee in percentage
Revenue in percentage
Ratio
Justice SH Kapadia **
65
29
76
24
Justice SP Bharucha
72
101
42
58
Justice Suhas Sen
13
27
33
67
Justice Ranganathan
18
12
60
40
Justice Sabyasachi Mukherjee
22
15
59
41
Justice Jeevan Reddy
12
14
46
54
Justice YV Chandrachud
10
12
45
55
Justice K Venkataswami
4
3
57
43
Justice YK Sabharwal
1
5
17
83
Justice Arijit Pasayat
14
13
52
48
Justice GB Pattanaik
8
16
33
67
Justice RC Lahoti
15
14
52
48
Justice BN Kirpal
5
5
50
50
* In favour of
** Jan 1 2008 - Jan 24 2012
Source: Taxmann/Taxsutra
The journal, as can be seen from the table, credited the source to Taxmann/Taxsutra.
Now can you predict a judgement based on the past verdicts of a judge? Is it fair? Are we analyzing a horse race or a cricket match?
A patient about to undergo an operation asked his doctor about the chances of his survival. “Hundred percent, said the doctor.” “How can you be so sure?”, asked the patient. “In this type of operations, the chances of survival, as statistics reveal, are ten percent; So far, all my nine patients have died and statistically, you are sure to survive!”, said the doctor.
