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2020 (8) TMI 108 - HC - VAT and Sales TaxConstitutional validity of Section 3(1A) of the Kerala Surcharge on Taxes Act, 1957 - Levy of surcharge on sales and purchase taxes - additional levies on the “big chains” coming into the “retail sector” - HELD THAT:- It is by now a settled law that the surcharge is in the nature of tax and that being so, levy of surcharge is not only violative of Article 301, but unconstitutional, unless similar levy of surcharge is also imposed on goods manufactured or produced in the State of Kerala. Section 3(1A) does not satisfy the first limitation prescribed under Article 304(a), i.e., similar levy on dealers engaged in sale of local goods and the second limitation permitting the State to levy a tax under Article 304(a) to be not discriminatory - The levy should not create any discrimination between the goods so imported or manufactured and produced. State Government in the matter of levy of taxes cannot discriminate between the goods imported from other States and manufactured or produced within the State levying such tax. The whole doctrine of classification is based upon the distinction and on a well known fact that the circumstances which govern one set of the persons and objects may not necessarily be the same governing the other set of persons - there is no illegality or perversity in the order of the learned single Judge to form a different opinion than the one held. Appeal dismissed.
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