Andhra HC (Pre-Telangana)
K.C.P. Limited And Anr. vs Commercial Tax Officer, Macherla, ... on 18 September, 2001
Equivalent citations: 2001(6)ALD377
JUDGMENT S.R. Nayak, J.
1. In this writ petition, the petitioners have assailed the constitutional validity of the provisions of Section 6-C of the Andhra Pradesh General Sales Tax Act, 1957, for short "the APGST Act" as amended by the amending Act 22 of 1995. The petitioners have also sought for a declaration that the amended Section 6-C of the Act has no application in respect of transactions of sale or purchase of articles which are specifically dealt with under item Nos.157 and 188 of the First Schedule to the APGST Act, whether such articles are sold separately or along with other articles and if they are found to be also applicable to all transactions of sale and purchase of articles specified under item Nos.157 and 188 of the First schedule the Act, then the said provisions of Section 6-C are liable to be declared as ultra vires of Articles 14, 19(1)(g) and 301 of the Constitution being arbitrary, discriminatory and unreasonable.
2. The challenge to the constitutional validity of the provisions of Section 6-C of the APGST Act as amended by Act No.22 of 1995 should fail in view of the judgment of this Court in Raasi Cement Limited and U. V. Krishnam Raju v. The Commercial Tax Officer, 24 APSTJ 100, wherein the constitutional validity of the provisions was upheld by this Court. However, the learned Counsel for the petitioner would strenuously contend that in Raasi Cement's case (supra) though this Court upheld the constitutional validity of Section 6-C of the APGST Act, on consideration of the ratio of the judgment of the Supreme Court in Raj Sheei v. State of Andhra Pradesh, 74 STC 379 (SC) and Vasavadatta Cements v. State of Karnataka, 101 STC 168 (SC), directed the assessing authority to determine in each case the ingredients of the contract of sale or agreement for sale relating to the container and also the intention of the parties in accordance with the judgment in Raasi Cement's case (supra) and therefore in the case of the petitioner also, such a direction be issued to the assessing authority.
3. On the other hand, the learned Special Government Pleader for Taxes would contend that having due regard to the clear and unambiguous provisions of Section 6-C of the APGST Act and also the judgment of the Apex Court in Premier Breweries v. State of Kerala, (1998) 108 STC 598, where the Apex Court has had an occasion to deal with the judgment of the Supreme Court in Raj Sheel's case (supra) and Vasavadatta Cements's case (supra), there is nothing left to the discretion of the assessing authority to determine the ingredients of the contract of sale or agreement of sale relating to the container.
4. Since the Court has already upheld the constitutional validity of Section 6-C as amended by amending Act in Raasi Cement's case (supra), there is no necessity for us to deal with that provision. However, suffice it to state that Section 6-C of the APGST Act unmistakably and without giving any scope for any other interpretation has legislatively declared that the rate of tax on packing material sold with the goods should be the same as that of the goods packed or filled, whether or not there is separate sale or agreement for sale for the packing materials and goods packed or filled. In that view of the matter, even accepting the contention of the learned Counsel for the petitioner in the instant case that there is a separate agreement of sale in respect of the goods packed and the packing material, the assessing authority is left with no discretion to tax the container and the goods packed separately by virtue of the deeming clause introduced in the provisions of Section 6-C of the APGST Act. Added to this, the Apex Court meeting almost similar contention in Premier Breweries's case (supra) and the provisions of Section 5(5) of the Kerala General Sales Tax Act which is in pari materia with the provisions of Section 6-C of the APGST Act and after referring to the two cases in Raj Sheel's case (supra) and Vasavadatta cement's case (supra) opined that the point of tax and rate of tax on containers and packing material shall be same as that of goods sold even where containers of packing materials are sold separately. In the light of this opinion of the Apex Court, the request of the learned Counsel for the petitioner to direct the assessing authority to determine the ingredients of the contract of sale or agreement for sale entered by the petitioner-dealer relating to the container and also the intention of the parties cannot be acceded to.
5. In the result, we dismiss the writ petition. No order as to costs.