Common parlance classification of composite goods: theodolite is not a telescope for sales tax entry purposes.

A taxing entry covering binoculars, telescopes and opera glasses was construed in its common parlance and commercial sense, not by dissecting a composite article into its parts. Theodolite was treated as an integrated surveying instrument used for measuring horizontal and vertical angles, distinct in trade and function from a telescope, even though it contains a telescope as one component. On that basis, the instrument was held outside entry 8 of the First Schedule to the Tamil Nadu General Sales Tax Act, 1959 and not taxable as a telescope under that entry.

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Issues: Whether theodolite, a survey instrument fitted with a telescope, falls within entry 8 of the First Schedule to the Tamil Nadu General Sales Tax Act, 1959 as a kind of telescope, or is a distinct commodity taxable under section 3(1) of that Act.

Analysis: The entry used the words binoculars, telescopes and opera glasses, which had to be understood in their commercial and popular sense. Theodolite was examined as an integrated surveying instrument used for measuring horizontal and vertical angles, distinct in trade and function from a telescope. The fact that it contains a telescope as one component did not justify treating the whole instrument as a telescope. Tax entries must be construed as market understood goods, and a finished product cannot be broken into component parts for classification when the product as sold is a separate commercial article.

Conclusion: Theodolite does not fall under entry 8 of the First Schedule to the Tamil Nadu General Sales Tax Act, 1959 and is not exigible to tax as a telescope under that entry; the assessee succeeded.

Ratio Decidendi: A taxing entry covering specified goods must be applied according to their common parlance and commercial identity, and a composite article is to be classified as a whole rather than by reference to one of its components.

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