Sales tax liability turns on commercial business character, not mere employee supplies at concessional rates.

Sales tax liability under the Bengal Finance (Sales Tax) Act, 1941 depended on whether the assessee was carrying on a business of selling goods, not on the mere existence of a sale for consideration. Regular supplies of coke-breeze and stores to employees at concessional or cost price, made as amenities and without a commercial object, did not amount to business activity. The absence of profit motive was relevant but not decisive; the decisive test was the presence of trade, commerce, or a concern in the nature of trade. The assessee was therefore not a dealer in respect of those supplies, and the transactions fell outside taxable turnover.

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Issues: Whether sales of coke-breeze and stores made by the assessee to its employees, without profit motive and at concessional rates, formed part of its taxable turnover under the Bengal Finance (Sales Tax) Act, 1941, and whether the assessee could be treated as a dealer in respect of those transactions.

Analysis: Liability to sales tax under the Act depended not merely on the existence of a sale for money consideration, but on the assessee carrying on the business of selling the goods in West Bengal. The amendment defining business made it clear that absence of profit motive by itself was not decisive; the basic requirement was that the activity must be trade, commerce, manufacture, or an adventure or concern in the nature of trade. Applying that test, the regular supply of coke-breeze and stores to employees as amenities at concessional or cost price, without a commercial object, did not amount to carrying on the business of selling those goods. The transactions were therefore outside the assessee's dealer character for the relevant assessment year.

Conclusion: The assessee was not a dealer in respect of the impugned supplies, and those sales were not taxable under the Act.

Ratio Decidendi: For sales tax liability under the Bengal Finance (Sales Tax) Act, 1941, the decisive test is whether the activity constitutes a commercial business of selling goods; mere receipts from regular supplies made without a business character and without a commercial object do not by themselves create dealer status or taxable turnover.

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