Inter-State sale turns on movement occasioned by the purchase, even without an express transport clause.

Purchase of sugarcane in Tamil Nadu, coupled with its immediate transport to a factory in Kerala, constituted an inter-State sale or purchase under section 3(a) of the Central Sales Tax Act, 1956. The movement of goods was not a separate transaction but was occasioned by, and inseparably connected with, the purchase itself; an express contractual stipulation of movement was unnecessary where interstate movement was implicit in the arrangement. Because the transaction was one integrated inter-State sale or purchase, the State sales tax levy could not be sustained, and the assessment was set aside.

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Issues: Whether the purchase of sugarcane and its movement from Tamil Nadu to Kerala constituted an inter-State sale or purchase falling within section 3(a) of the Central Sales Tax Act, 1956, and therefore outside the taxing power under the Tamil Nadu General Sales Tax Act, 1959.

Analysis: The movement of the goods from one State to another was not an independent or subsequent transaction. The permission to purchase sugarcane in Tamil Nadu was granted only for the purpose of transporting it to the factory in Kerala, and the goods purchased were in fact so transported. The purchase and movement were thus inseparably connected and formed parts of one integrated transaction. It was not necessary that the contract expressly stipulate movement, because movement may be implicit in the sale or purchase. In such a case, the fact that the sale may have occurred within one State does not prevent the transaction from being inter-State if the movement of goods was occasioned by that sale or purchase.

Conclusion: The transaction was an inter-State sale or purchase within section 3(a) of the Central Sales Tax Act, 1956, and the levy under the State sales tax law could not be sustained.

Final Conclusion: The assessment was set aside because the sale and movement of goods were held to be part of one indivisible inter-State transaction.

Ratio Decidendi: A sale or purchase is inter-State where it occasions the movement of goods from one State to another, even if the sale is completed within one State and the movement is not expressly stipulated, provided the movement is inseparably connected with the transaction.

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