Actionable claim treatment for recharge vouchers excludes them from goods and sales tax under the West Bengal statute.

Recharge coupon vouchers transferred by a service provider to distributors or agents were treated as actionable claims rather than goods. The Tribunal reasoned that the vouchers conferred only a right to obtain telecommunication services for a fixed value and period, and that this incorporeal right fell within the statutory definition of actionable claim under the Transfer of Property Act, 1882. Because actionable claims are excluded from the definition of goods under the West Bengal Sales Tax Act, 1994, the vouchers were not exigible to sales tax. Transferability did not alter the character of the right, and the assessment could not be sustained on that basis.

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Issues: Whether recharge coupon vouchers transferred by the service provider to its distributors or agents were actionable claims and, therefore, excluded from the definition of goods and not exigible to sales tax under the West Bengal Sales Tax Act, 1994.

Analysis: The Tribunal treated recharge coupon vouchers as instruments by which the subscriber obtained the right to receive telecommunication services for a fixed value and period, with no use other than access to the service provider's network. Applying the statutory definition of actionable claim under section 3 of the Transfer of Property Act, 1882 and the exclusion of actionable claims from section 2(13) of the West Bengal Sales Tax Act, 1994, it held that the purchaser acquired a beneficial interest in movable property not in possession of the claimant. It further relied on the principle that transferability does not change the character of an actionable claim, and followed the reasoning in Sunrise Associates that such incorporeal rights are outside sales tax where the statute excludes actionable claims from goods.

Conclusion: Recharge coupon vouchers are actionable claims, not taxable goods, and the assessment order could not be sustained on that issue.

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