Penalty not leviable for minor omission in declaration form when essential particulars and supporting documents were otherwise complete.

Penalty under the Rajasthan Sales Tax Act was not leviable where the declaration form accompanying the goods contained the material particulars needed to identify the goods and transaction, and only the invoice number and date were left blank. The HC distinguished Guljag Industries, holding that it applied to forms missing essential particulars such as quality, weight, description and value, not to a minor inadvertent omission that did not go to the root of the declaration. On the facts, the goods were accompanied by the relevant bills and vouchers, so penalty under Section 78(5) was not exigible and the order deleting the penalty was sustained.

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Issues: Whether penalty under Section 78(5) of the Rajasthan Sales Tax Act, 1994 was leviable where the declaration form accompanying the goods was otherwise complete but the invoice number and date were left blank.

Analysis: The Court held that the earlier ruling in Guljag Industries applied only where the declaration form was blank in respect of the essential particulars required to identify the goods and the transaction, such as quality, weight, description and value. On the facts before it, all such material particulars had been filled in and the goods were accompanied by the relevant bills and vouchers. The omission was confined to the invoice number and date, which was treated as an inadvertent omission and not a defect going to the root of the declaration form for the purpose of penalty.

Conclusion: The Court held that the case was distinguishable on facts and that penalty under Section 78(5) was not exigible.

Final Conclusion: The revision failed, and the order deleting the penalty was sustained.

Ratio Decidendi: Penalty under the relevant sales tax provisions is not warranted where the declaration form contains the material particulars required to identify the goods and transaction, and only a minor inadvertent omission remains.

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