TMI Blog1962 (4) TMI 81X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... he M.P. General Sales Tax Act, 1958. When it came to the notice of the Sales Tax Officer, Raigarh, that the petitioner had carried on business of supplying ballast to the railway administration without registration as required by section 8 of the Act of 1947, he initiated proceedings under section 11(5) of that Act which provided for best judgment assessment on a dealer liable to pay tax under the Act in respect of any period and who had failed to apply for registration. The Sales Tax Officer, Raigarh, assessed the petitioner to a tax of Rs. 8,163-7-9 for the period from 1st March, 1958, to 30th June, 1958, and imposed on him a penalty of Rs. 2,000. Subsequently, the Sales Tax Authorities learnt that the petitioner was carrying on business at Raipur and Bilaspur also. On investigation they learnt that the petitioner's principal place of business of supplying ballast to the railway administration was Bilaspur. Thereupon the Assistant Commissioner, Sales Tax, Bilaspur, issued a notice to the petitioner under section 18(6) of the M.P. General Sales Tax Act, 1958, in form XVI for best judgment assessment and calling upon him to appear and to produce books of accounts and documents stat ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... igarh; (ii) that the contracts taken by him were not contracts for sale or supply of goods but were "contracts of work"; that the supply of ballast was not a sale to the railway administration under the terms and conditions of the various contracts; (iii) that the Assistant Commissioner had wrongly included in the turnover the receipts of the S.P. Consolidated Engineering Co. (P.) Ltd., which was altogether a different legal entity; and (iv) that the best judgment assessment made by the Assistant Commissioner was not based on any information or material and that the Assistant Commissioner did not disclose to him the material obtained by him from the railway authorities and did not give the petitioner any opportunity to rebut that material and thus in making the assessment the Assistant Commissioner acted contrary to the principles of natural justice. 4.. All these allegations have been denied by the opponents in the return filed on their behalf. It has been averred in the return that the petitioner's contracts with the railway authorities were for the sale and supply of ballast and were not any "contracts of work"; that the applicant's principal place of business being Bilaspur, ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... section 8(5) of the C. P. and Berar Sales Tax Act, 1947, provided that on the conviction of a dealer for carrying on business as a dealer without getting himself registered, the Commissioner should register and grant him a certificate of registration and that certificate shall take effect as if it had been made under sub-section (3) of section 8 on the dealer's application. It cannot also be disputed that section 18(6) of the Act of 1958 deals with the assessment on a dealer who is liable to pay tax in respect of any period but who has failed to apply for registration. It says"If upon information which has come into his possession, the Commissioner is satisfied that any dealer, who has been liable to pay tax in respect of any period, has failed to apply for registration the Commissioner shall, at any time within six calendar years from the expiry of the whole of such period, after giving the dealer a reasonable opportunity of being heard, proceed in such manner, as may be prescribed, to assess to the best of his judgment the amount of tax due from the dealer in respect of the whole of such period and all subsequent periods; and the Commissioner may, if he is satisfied that the dea ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... Seth Hirdoomal, Railway Contractor, holding Head Office, situated at Near Co-operative Bank, Bilaspur". The petitioner's averment in the application that his principal place of business was at Raigarh is thus untrue and belied by the statements made by himself in the annexures referred to above. It must, therefore, be taken that the petitioner's principal place of business was Bilaspur. It is not disputed that the applicant's business of supplying ballast to the railway administration was also carried on at Raigarh and Raipur. Now, rule 2(1)(b) defines "appropriate Sales Tax Officer" thus"'appropriate Sales Tax Officer' in relation to any particular dealer means the Sales Tax Officer of the circle in which the dealer's place of business is situated, or, if a dealer has more than one place of business in the State, the Sales Tax Officer of the circle in which his head office or principal place of business is situated." This rule makes it clear that the Sale Tax Officer who was competent to make any assessment on the petitioner was the Sales Tax Officer of Bilaspur where the principal place of the petitioner's business was situated and not the Sales Tax Officer, Raigarh. The Sales ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... this Court in Daluram Pannalal Modi v. Assistant Commissioner of Sales TaxM.P. No. 114 of 1961, decided on 5th April, 1962; since reported at [1962] 13 S.T.C. 759. On the reasoning given in Daluram Pannalal's case(1), it must be held that the notice under section 18(6) read with rule 33 issued by the Assistant Commissioner, who is a person appointed under section 3 to assist the Commissioner and to whom all powers under section 18(6) have been delegated by the Commissioner in conformity with section 30 read with rule 68, on information received by him and after satisfying himself as required by section 18(6) is not bad or beyond the jurisdiction of the Assistant Commissioner. The petitioner's objection that no assessment under section 18(6) could at all be made against him and that the Assistant Commissioner had no jurisdiction to make any assessment under that provision must, therefore, be rejected. 7.. Equally unsubstantial is the contention of the petitioner that the supply of ballast by him to the railway administration did not constitute any sale of the material but was only a "contract of work". Quite apart from the fact that the applicant though directed by the Assistant C ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... der section 18(6), the applicant appeared before the Assistant Commissioner on 23rd November, 1960, through a counsel who asked for an adjournment which was granted. On the next day, that is, 24th November, 1960, the counsel asked for the stay of proceedings on the ground that the Sales Tax Commissioner had passed a stay order in the revision petition filed by the petitioner against the assessment order made by the Sales Tax Officer, Raigarh. A copy of the Commissioner's order was not, however, produced by the petitioner. The petitioner's prayer for stay of proceedings was, therefore, rightly rejected by the Assistant Commissioner. On 20th and 22nd of December, 1960, the petitioner's agent Bhagwandas submitted the consolidated statement of the return; the statement of Bhagwandas was recorded but no account books or any documents were produced. Indeed in the statement which the agent gave it was deposed by him that no regular account books were maintained by the petitioner and there were no vouchers to support the statement of turnover filed by him. On 20th January, 1961, the petitioner's counsel was shown the statement received from the railway authorities about the value of ballas ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... ay administration. The grievance that the Assistant Commissioner made the assessment without waiting for the report of the Sales Tax Officer, Raipur, is baseless. The report was actually received on 15th March, 1961, and it was after the receipt of this report that a fresh date was fixed and intimation of the same was given to the applicant who then first asked for an adjournment and then absented. The order of assessment was passed on 18th August, 1961. Thereafter at about 4-30 p.m. on the same day an application signed by a representative of the petitioner was received by the Assistant Commissioner saying that the petitioner's counsel was out of station and could not appear and that he himself was present and wanted to file an application but that he was not allowed to appear. The Assistant Commissioner rightly took no notice of this complaint. Again, the submission which the representative wanted to make was no other than that the petitioner having been assessed by the Sales Tax Officer, Raigarh, the Assistant Commissioner had no jurisdiction to assess him. This is evident from annexure 10 to the petition. That objection, as already pointed out by us, is devoid of any merit. In ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X
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