Commercial parlance test excludes semi-finished glass shells from glassware classification and supports lower-rate unclassified treatment.

In sales tax classification, glass shells sold in semi-finished form were held not to fall within the entry for goods and wares made of glass because classification depends on commercial parlance, not literal or scientific meaning. The court applied the trade understanding test and found that the articles were only intermediate products used by another manufacturer for making bulbs, with no ordinary market identity as finished glassware. They were therefore treated as unclassified goods liable at the lower rate of tax, and the revision failed.

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Issues: Whether glass shells manufactured and sold in semi-finished form by the dealer fall within entry No. 4 of Notification No. ST-2-5784-10(1)-80-U.P. Act 15/48 Order81 dated 07.09.1981 as goods and wares made of glass, or are to be treated as unclassified goods liable to tax at the lower rate.

Analysis: The relevant entry covered all goods and wares made of glass, but the description had to be understood in the sense in which the commodity is known in commercial parlance. In sales tax classification, the decisive test is not the literal or scientific meaning of the words, but the meaning attached to the article by persons dealing in it in trade. Applying that test, the glass shells were found to be only semi-finished articles, used by another manufacturer for making bulbs, and not articles ordinarily sold to consumers as glassware. Their commercial use was confined to further manufacture, and they were not treated in trade as finished goods made of glass.

Conclusion: The glass shells did not fall within the notified entry for goods and wares made of glass and were rightly treated as unclassified goods. The assessee was entitled to the lower rate of tax, and the revision failed.

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