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TMI Blog1963 (1) TMI 1X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... competent or not ; and this question has to be determined in the light of the scope and effect of section 18-A of the Act. The appellant is a firm of merchants carrying on commission agency and other business at Kurnool and, as such, it purchases and sells groundnuts and other goods on behalf of principals for commission. For the year 1952-53, the sales tax authorities included in the appellant's taxable turnover an amount of Rs. 3,45,488-12-10 representing groundnut sales and collected the tax on the total turnover from it in September, 1953, when the amount of the said tax was determined and duly adjusted. The said turnover of Rs. 3,45,488-12-10 in fact represented sales of groundnuts and not purchases and tax was recovered from the appellant on the said amount illegally, inasmuch as it is only on purchase of groundnuts that the tax is leviable. As a result of this illegal levy, the appellant had to pay Rs. 5,398-4-3 for the said year. Similarly, for the subsequent year 1953-54 the appellant had to pay an illegal tax of Rs. 1,159-11-9. In its plaint, the appellant claimed to recover this amount together with interest at 12 per cent. per annum and that is how the claim was va ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... nch of the High Court. The Full Bench has upheld the contentions raised by the respondent. It has held that in view of the provisions of section 18A of the Act, the suit is incompetent. Alternatively, it has found that, on the merits, the claim made by the appellant was not justified. The result of these findings was that the respondent's appeal was allowed and the appellant's suit was dismissed with costs. The appellant had filed cross-objections claiming additional interest on the decretal amount, but since its suit was held to be incompetent by the High Court, its cross-objections failed and were dismissed with costs. It is against this decree that the appellant has come to this court by special leave. Mr. Ranganadham Chetty, for the appellant, contends that the High Court was in error in coming to the conclusion that the appellant's suit was incompetent because he argues that the High Court has misjudged the effect of the provisions of section 18A. In dealing with the question whether the civil courts' jurisdiction to entertain a suit is barred or not, it is necessary to bear in mind the fact that there is a general presumption that there must be a remedy in th ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... as obviously necessary to refer not only to acts done, but also to acts purporting to be done under this Act. Section 17(1) is intended to bar certain proceedings and section 18 is intended to afford an indemnity and that is the reason why the legislature had to adopt the usual formula by referring to acts done or purporting to be done. It was wholly unnecessary to refer to cases of assessment purporting to have been made under this Act while enacting section 18A, because all assessments made under this Act would attract the provisions of section 18A and that is all that the legislature intends section 18A to cover. The expression " any assessment made under this Act " is, in our opinion, wide enough to cover all assessments made by the appropriate authorities under this Act whether the said assessments are correct or not. It is the activity of the assessing officer acting as such officer which is intended to be protected and as soon as it is shown that exercising his jurisdiction and authority under this Act, an assessing officer has made an order of assessment, that clearly falls within the scope of section 18A. The fact that the order passed by the assessing authority may in fa ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... A suit instituted for that purpose would be barred under section 18A. The facts alleged by the appellant in this case are somewhat unusual. The appellant itself made voluntary returns under the relevant provisions of the Act and included the groundnut transactions as taxable transactions. It was never alleged by the appellant that the said transactions were transactions of sale and, as such, not liable to be taxed under the Act. It is true that under section 5A(2) groundnut is made liable to tax under section 3(1) only at the point of the first purchase effected in the State by a dealer who is not exempt from taxation under section 3(3), but at the rate of 2 per cent. on his turnover. When the appellant made its voluntary returns and paid the tax in advance to be adjusted at the end of the year from time to time, it treated the groundnut transactions as taxable under section 5A(2). In other words, the appellant itself having conceded the taxable character of the transactions in question, no occasion arose for the taxing authority to consider whether the said transactions could be taxed or not ; and even after the impugned orders of assessment were made, the appellant did not choose ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... cial procedure. " It is necessary to add that these observations, though made in somewhat wide terms, do not justify the assumption that if a decision has been made by a taxing authority under the provisions of the relevant taxing statute, its validity can be challenged by a suit on the ground that it is incorrect on the merits and, as such, it can be claimed that the provisions of the said statute have not been complied with. Non-compliance with the provisions of the statute to which reference is made by the Privy Council must, we think, be non-compliance with such fundamental provisions of the statute as would make the entire proceedings before the appropriate authority illegal and without jurisdiction. Similarly, if an appropriate authority has acted in violation of the fundamental principles of judicial procedure, that may also tend to make the proceedings illegal and void and this infirmity may affect the validity of the order passed by the authority in question. It is in cases of this character where the defect or the infirmity in the order goes to the root of the order and makes it in law invalid and void that these observations may perhaps be invoked in support of the plea ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X
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