Manufacture and revisional jurisdiction under sales tax law: LPG bottling is not manufacture, and a third revision is ultra vires.

Bottling LPG into cylinders is treated as a mere transfer for transport and consumption, not as manufacture, because it does not create a new and distinct commercial article with a different name, character or use. The suggested mercaptan blending basis was rejected on the facts, as the evidence did not show that such processing occurred at the bottling plant. The article also explains that the West Bengal Sales Tax Rules provide only two revisional tiers, so a third revision before the Additional Commissioner was beyond statutory competence and without jurisdiction. On that basis, the challenge to the registration amendment and the later revisional order was rejected.

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Issues: (i) Whether bottling LPG into cylinders amounts to manufacture under the West Bengal Sales Tax Act, 1994. (ii) Whether the Additional Commissioner could entertain a third revision under the statutory revision scheme.

Issue (i): Whether bottling LPG into cylinders amounts to manufacture under the West Bengal Sales Tax Act, 1994.

Analysis: Manufacture under section 2(17) of the West Bengal Sales Tax Act, 1994 requires producing, making or extracting goods, and the settled test is whether a process results in a new and distinct commercial article with a different name, character or use. The bottling process described in the record showed only transfer of LPG from bulk storage into cylinders for convenience of transport and consumption, without any intrinsic chemical or commercial transformation. The attempted reliance on blending with mercaptan also failed on the facts, as the evidence showed that such addition was not done at the bottling plant and no material supported the claimed further processing.

Conclusion: Bottling LPG into cylinders does not amount to manufacture, and the rejection of amendment of the registration certificate was justified.

Issue (ii): Whether the Additional Commissioner could entertain a third revision under the statutory revision scheme.

Analysis: The revision structure under rule 244(2) of the West Bengal Sales Tax Rules contemplates only two tiers of revisional remedy. Where the original order is passed by the Commercial Tax Officer, the first revision lies before the Assistant Commissioner and the second before the Deputy Commissioner. No further revisional forum is provided after the second revision. An order passed by an authority lacking such statutory competence is without jurisdiction and cannot sustain consideration of fresh factual pleas not raised before the competent forums.

Conclusion: The Additional Commissioner had no jurisdiction to act as a third revisional authority, and his order was non est.

Final Conclusion: The application failed on merits and also because the last revisional order was passed without statutory authority; the challenge was rejected in full.

Ratio Decidendi: A process amounts to manufacture only if it brings into existence a new and distinct commercial article, and a statutory revision cannot be entertained beyond the revision tiers expressly provided by the governing Act and Rules.

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