TMI Blog2004 (11) TMI 325X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... Tripurari Ray, Manoj Saxena, and Mohanprasad Meharia, Advocates for the appellants. Y. Rajagopala Rao, Ms. Sasnita Tripathy and Y. Ramesh, Advocates for respondent in C.A. Nos. 1671 and 1672 of 1999. P.S. Narasimha, Ananga Bhattacharya and V.G. Pragasam, Advocates for respondents Nos. 1 to 25 and 27 to 62 in C.A. No. 1670 of 1999. -------------------------------------------------- ORDER These appeals are against the judgment of the Andhra Pradesh High Court dated September 2, 1998 See [1999] 112 STC 51. Briefly stated the facts are as follows: Under the Andhra Pradesh General Sales Tax Act, 1957, sales tax was leviable on jewellery at the rate of four per cent, by virtue of item 21 of the First Schedule ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... the notification appended to G. O. Ms. No. 303, Revenue (CT. II) Department, dated April 15, 1997 for clause (a) read as follows: '(a) The tax leviable under the said Act in respect of sales of arti- cles of jewellery made of bullion or specie or both, including precious stones shall be at the reduced rate of three per cent.'" This errata clarifies that even on jewellery the tax would be leviable at the reduced rate of three per cent. After issuance of this errata, writ petitions were filed by some of the jewellers claiming that the errata could operate prospectively only. It was claimed that for the period between April 23, 1997 and May 3, 1998, the tax was to be levied at the rate of two per cent as per G. O. No. 252. By the impugn ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... ent to three per cent. The High Court has therefore, also erred in concluding that the rate of tax has been increased. The whole judgment proceeds on the basis that the rate of tax has been increased when in fact it has been reduced. We are unable to accept the submission that as the G. O. Ms. No. 304 is an errata it necessarily means that G. O. Ms. No. 303 had never come into existence. The word errata, in our view, implies that there was something in existence which is being corrected. The fact that this was an errata itself showed that there was something in existence which was being corrected. This aspect has also been overlooked by the High Court. It was also submitted that since there was a lot of confusion and that number of part ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X
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