Jurisprudentiol – Thursday's cases

By Vijay Kumar

Legal Corner Icon — the image was hosted by the publisher and was not captured.Central Excise

Sales Tax incentive scheme - amount of sales tax collected from customers but not paid to State Government by assessees availing above incentive is deemed to have been paid to Government – such amount is not an additional consideration and is excludible from Assessable value u/s 4 of CEA , 1944: CESTAT

THE appellant did not include in the assessable value of the excisable goods the amount of sales tax which they collected from their customers but did not pay to the exchequer. According to Revenue, such amount of sales tax is an additional consideration forming part of the transaction value of the excisable goods under section 4(3)(d) of the Central Excise Act. And thus, the differential Central Excise duty was demanded and the same was confirmed by the original adjudicating authority and the Commissioner( Appeals).

Income Tax

Contribution to building fund of stock exchange claimed as revenue expenditure – DCIT directed to consider all contentions put forth by petitioner and pass appropriate orders in tune with earlier directions of High Court – Stand taken by Stock Exchange before High Court also to be considered – Order passed by DCIT holding contribution as capital expenditure set aside: High Court

THE petitioner approached the High Court through a Writ Petition urging that the Deputy Commissioner of Income Tax passed an arbitrary order completely disregarding the earlier remand directions of this High Court in a statutory appeal filed by the petitioner against an order passed by the Appellate Tribunal.

The issue involved was claim of building contribution fund made by the petitioner to Cochin Stock Exchange as revenue expenditure whereas the assessing authority held it as capital expenditure. Earlier, in the first round of litigation, the first appellate authority extended the benefit to the petitioner but the same was reversed by the Tribunal . Aggrieved by the Tribunal's order an appeal was filed before the High Court in terms of Section 260A of the Income Tax Act.

Customs

Valuation – assessment made purely on basis of LME Bulletin without any corroborative evidence of contemporaneous import, not valid: Supreme Court

EVEN though there is a reference to contemporaneous import in the order passed by the Deputy Commissioner, no material regarding such import has been placed or made available by the appellant at any point of time. Therefore, assessment in this case has to be taken as having been made purely on the basis of LME Bulletin without any corroborative evidence of imports at or near that price which is not permissible under law.

See our columns Tomorrow for the judgements