Cricket tournament organisation not event management service when sponsors only displayed advertisements and no service was rendered to them.

Organising a cricket tournament with franchisees, sponsors and co-sponsors did not amount to event management service where the organisers ran the event on their own and no franchisee or co-sponsor requested them to organise it. Event management under the Finance Act, 1994 covers services connected with planning, promotion, organisation or presentation of specified events, but the arrangement here was only for advertisement display during the tournament. On that basis, the service tax demand was held unsustainable.

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Issues: Whether organising a cricket tournament with franchisees, sponsors and co-sponsors amounted to provision of event management service liable to service tax.

Analysis: Event management under Section 65(40) of the Finance Act, 1994 covers services in relation to planning, promotion, organising or presentation of specified events, and an event manager under Section 65(41) is a person providing such service. On the facts, there was no request from any franchisee or co-sponsor to organise the tournament. The respondents organised the cricket event on their own, while sponsors and franchisees only displayed advertisements during the tournament. The arrangement was found to be on the same footing as the earlier tribunal ruling relied upon, where the assessee was held to have organised the event for itself and not to have rendered event management service to the sponsors.

Conclusion: Organising the tournament in these circumstances did not constitute event management service, and the service tax demand was not sustainable.

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