Penalty liability on continuation of business after death requires express statutory wording; tax alone does not imply penalty.

Saving provisions preserved the earlier sales tax law for levy and penalty relating to pre-appointed-day periods, so the later Act could not create a new penalty liability where none existed under the repealed Act. In the continuation-of-business after death context, the Act used only "tax due" in the relevant clause, while another clause for discontinuance of business expressly referred to "tax (including any penalty)". That wording showed penalty was deliberately excluded from the continuing-business category. Section 34 could not expand the scope of section 19(1)(a), and penalty could not be imposed on the legal representative merely because the business continued after death.

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Issues: Whether, on the death of a dealer after the coming into force of the Bombay Sales Tax Act, 1959, penalty under section 16(4) of the Bombay Sales Tax Act, 1953 could be imposed on the legal representative who continued the business.

Analysis: The saving provisions of sections 76 and 77 of the Bombay Sales Tax Act, 1959 continued the earlier law for levy, assessment, reassessment, collection, refund, set-off and penalty in respect of periods before the appointed day. For such pre-appointed-day periods, the liability remained governed by the earlier law, and the 1959 Act could not be invoked to create a penalty liability where none existed under the repealed Act. Section 19(1) of the 1959 Act made a clear distinction between clause (a), dealing with continuation of business after death and using only the expression "tax due", and clause (b), dealing with discontinuance of business and expressly including "tax (including any penalty)". That distinction showed that penalty was intentionally omitted from clause (a). Section 34, which applies only where liability under section 19 already exists, could not enlarge the scope of section 19(1)(a). Penalty was treated as distinct from tax, and the relevant provisions did not authorize its imposition on the legal representative in the continuing-business situation.

Conclusion: The legal representative was not liable to penalty under section 16(4) of the Bombay Sales Tax Act, 1953 merely because the 1959 Act had come into force and the business was continued after death.

Final Conclusion: The reference was answered by upholding the Tribunal's view that the penalty could not be sustained against the legal representative in the facts of the case.

Ratio Decidendi: Where a repealing and saving statute preserves the earlier law for pre-appointed-day liability, and the successor statute separately uses "tax" in one provision but "tax (including any penalty)" in another, penalty cannot be implied for the continuing-business category unless the statute expressly so provides.

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