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2020 (1) TMI 800 - SC - VAT and Sales TaxLevy of Sales Tax - sale of goods imported from foreign country - to foreign bound ships as “ship stores” - sale or not - whether the subject sales (of goods imported from foreign country and after unloading the same on the landmass of the State of West Bengal, kept in the bonded warehouse without payment of customs duty) to foreign bound ships as “ship stores” can be regarded as sale within the territory of the State and amenable to sales tax under the West Bengal Sales Tax Act, 1954 or the West Bengal Sales Tax Act, 1994? HELD THAT:- The sale to be in the course of import, must be a sale of goods and as a consequence of such sale, the goods must actually be imported within the territory of India and further, the sale must be part and parcel of the import so as to occasion import thereof. Indeed, for the purposes of Customs Act, only upon payment of customs duty the goods are cleared by the Customs authorities whence import thereof can be regarded as complete. However, that would be no impediment for levy of sales tax by the State concerned in whose territory the goods had already landed/unloaded and kept in the bonded warehouse. Indubitably, the sale which is to be regarded as exempt from payment of sales tax, is a sale which causes the import to take place or is the immediate cause of the import of goods. The appellants having failed to establish that the stated goods would be actually imported within the territory of India and had not crossed the customs station, cannot contend that the sale was in the course of import as such within the meaning of Section 5 read with Section 2(ab) of the CST Act. Moreover, there is no direct linkage between the import of the goods and the sale in question to qualify as having been made in the process or progress of import. There are no hesitation in accepting the argument of the respondents that being a taxation statute, strict interpretation of these provisions is inevitable. Going by the definition of “customs port” or “land customs station” as applicable in the present cases, it is customs port or land customs station area appointed by the Central Government in terms of notification under Section 7 - As the stated goods had travelled beyond the customs port/land customs station at the relevant time, in law, it would mean that the goods had crossed the customs frontiers of India for the purposes of the CST Act. Resultantly, the legal fiction created in Section 5(2) of the CST Act will have no application. In the present case, it is not the case of the appellant that the goods in question were being exported. Since the goods are to be consumed on the board of the foreign going ship and the same would be consumed before reaching a destination, it does not fall under the definition of ‘export’. The sale cannot qualify as a sale occasioning export unless the goods reach a destination which is a place outside India. Further, since the goods have been sold from the bonded warehouse and had crossed the customs port/land customs station prior to their sale, it cannot qualify as a sale in course of export within the meaning of Section 5(1) read with Section 2(ab) of the CST Act. Appeal dismissed.
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