TMI Blog2008 (8) TMI 26X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... ng, Vice President and Rakesh Kumar, Member (Technical) Shri K. K. Anand, Advocate, for the appellant. Shri A. K. Madan, Authorized Representative (DR), for the Respondent. [Order per. Rakesh Kumar Member (Technical)] - The Appellant are an Institution recognized by the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research, Ministry of Science and Technology and according to them they are engaged only in Scientific and Technical consultancy for which they took regionwise service tax registration. In Punjab they took the Service tax registration for Scientific and technical consultancy on 12/09/01. A show cause notice dated 18/03/04 was issued to the Appellant alleging that during period from October 1998 to July 2001, they provid ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... Appellant's activities is clear from their 'Memorandum of Association, from which it is clear that their activities come within the ambit of Scientific Technical Consultancy only. (ii) NPC Headquarters at Lodi Road, New Delhi had earlier been recognized as 'Consulting Engineers' by the office of Deputy Commissioner, Service tax but after thorough scrutiny of the nature of their services, NPC was registered under Scientific and Technical Consultancy, not in 'Management Consultancy' category. All regional offices of NPC in different states are registered under 'Scientific Technical Consultancy' and are paying service tax on that basis. (iii) The services being provided by the Appellant relate to impr ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... vice, consultancy or scientific or technical assistance, rendered in any manner, either directly or indirectly, by a scientist or a technocrat, or any science or technology institution or organization, to a client, in one or more disciplines of science or technology. 3.2 Management Consultant's Service is taxable since 16/10/98 and definition of Management Consultant during the period of dispute, is any person providing any service, either directly or indirectly, in connection with management and includes any person who renders any advice, consultancy or technical assistance relating to conceptualizing, devising, development, modification, rectification or upgradation of any working system of any organization. 3.3 During August ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... ass ; (l) Production system design, and (m) ISO certification. We are of the view that all these projects involve giving scientific or technical advice in the areas of some or other disciplines of Science or technology. The projects at (f) and (k) are obviously Environment Engineering project. The remaining categories of projects pertain to optimizing the efficiency and output of an industry or an organization and hence the same pertain to the discipline of Industrial Engineering. We are supported in our view from the exposition of the term 'Industrial Engineering' in World Book Encyclopedia (Vol.6), which is reproduced below, - Industrial Engineering applies to engineering analysis and techniques to the production of ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... eir main objectives are - (a) Increasing productivity in all spheres of industries and to pave the way for launching productivity drive in all spheres of economic activity of the country and ; (b) Undertaking scientific research activities related to productivity. 4.4 Thus the thrust of the Appellant's activity is conducting scientific research related to productivity and undertaking technical study in this regard for their clients and tendering advice to them for optimizing their productivity. In view of this we hold that out of the two competing entries Management Consultancy and Scientific or Technical Consultancy the Appellant are more appropriately covered by the later. 5. In view of the above discussion, the impugn ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X
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