Statutory registration requires objective verification of business character, and provisional certificate benefits end on effective registration.

A statutory registration scheme requires the registering authority to verify the truth and correctness of the application materials and to determine the applicant's true business character on objective satisfaction, rather than accepting the stated description blindly. Registration under section 26(5) is a quasi-judicial exercise, so registration may be granted in the character disclosed by the facts. The provisional certificate rules were read as a unified scheme: a provisional certificate cannot survive once the dealer becomes registered, and the retrospective amendment to rule 28 was treated as clarificatory because that position was regarded as always implicit in the rules. Promissory estoppel was rejected.

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Issues: (i) whether the registering authority could, on an application for registration as a manufacturer, grant registration as a reseller on the basis of the materials before it; and (ii) whether the provisional certificate continued to operate after the certificate of registration became effective, including the validity of the retrospective amendment to rule 28.

Issue (i): whether the registering authority could, on an application for registration as a manufacturer, grant registration as a reseller on the basis of the materials before it.

Analysis: The scheme of registration under the West Bengal Sales Tax Act, 1994 and the West Bengal Sales Tax Rules, 1995 required the registering authority to be satisfied not merely about the form of the application, but about the truth and correctness of the particulars furnished. The expression "in order" was held to require objective satisfaction on the facts and to permit enquiry. Registration under section 26(5) was treated as a quasi-judicial exercise, and the authority was not bound to accept the applicant's self-description if the facts disclosed a different business character. On that basis, if the materials showed the applicant to be a reseller, registration could validly be granted in that character.

Conclusion: The registering authority had jurisdiction to register the applicant as a reseller, and the challenge on that ground failed.

Issue (ii): whether the provisional certificate continued to operate after the certificate of registration became effective, including the validity of the retrospective amendment to rule 28.

Analysis: The rules relating to provisional certificates were construed as a complete scheme operating together. Rule 26(2) excluded persons already registered or liable to be registered from eligibility for a provisional certificate, and rules 30 and 31 were read harmoniously so that a provisional certificate could not survive once the dealer became registered. The retrospective amendment inserting the proviso to rule 28 was treated as merely clarificatory, because the legal position was held to have always been that the provisional certificate stood revoked from the date the registration certificate became effective. The plea of promissory estoppel was rejected, and the amended rule was upheld as valid.

Conclusion: The provisional certificate became inoperative from the effective date of registration, and the retrospective amendment to rule 28 was valid.

Final Conclusion: The applications were disposed of by upholding the effective revocation of the provisional certificate on registration, while directing a fresh disposal of the registration application and permitting assessments in accordance with the declared legal position.

Ratio Decidendi: In a statutory registration scheme, the registering authority must determine the applicant's true business character on objective satisfaction from the materials before it, and a provisional certificate cannot continue once the dealer becomes registered or liable to be registered if the scheme, read harmoniously, makes the provisional benefit subject to that event.

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