Broad definition of business brings occasional sale of obsolete spare parts within sales tax net as casual dealer liability.

A sales tax statute that broadly defines "business" to include incidental or ancillary transactions and also includes casual dealers can bring occasional sales of surplus or obsolete items within tax net even without a regular trading activity or profit motive. Sales of unserviceable spare parts and allied materials arising from the transport business were held to be connected with the business operations and, at minimum, occasional transactions of a business nature. The respondent was therefore liable to be treated as a dealer, including a casual dealer, and the impugned sales were exigible to sales tax.

---

---

Issues: Whether the respondent, engaged in running buses and selling unserviceable, old, obsolete and unused spare parts and allied materials, was liable to be treated as a dealer, including a casual dealer, and thereby liable to sales tax and registration under the Orissa Sales Tax Act, 1947.

Analysis: The charging provision fastened tax liability on every dealer whose turnover exceeded the prescribed limit, while the Act defined "dealer" to include a person carrying on the business of selling goods and also a "casual dealer" making occasional transactions of a business nature. "Business" was broadly defined to include not only trade, commerce or manufacture, but also transactions incidental or ancillary to such activity, without requiring a profit motive. The respondent's sale of obsolete and unserviceable parts, fuel, oil and similar materials arose from its business operations and could not be treated as disconnected from its transport activity. Even if the sales were not part of a regular trading business, they constituted occasional transactions of a business nature and therefore attracted the statutory concept of a casual dealer.

Conclusion: The respondent was liable to be treated as a dealer, at least as a casual dealer, and the sales of spare parts and allied items were exigible to sales tax under the Act.

Final Conclusion: The appeals succeeded, the High Court's view was set aside, and the tax liability of the respondent on the impugned sales was affirmed.

Ratio Decidendi: Where a sales tax statute defines "business" broadly to include incidental or ancillary transactions and expressly includes casual dealers, occasional sales of unserviceable or surplus items arising from the dealer's main business are taxable even without a regular trading activity or profit motive.

---