Lottery tickets are not goods for sales tax; the transfer is only an actionable claim, not a sale of goods.

A lottery ticket was treated as evidence of a purchaser's chance to win a prize, not as "goods" for sales tax purposes. The analysis applied the classical meaning of sale of goods, read with Article 366(29A)(a), and held that the decisive question is whether the subject of transfer is movable property excluding an actionable claim. Because the ticket conferred only a conditional or contingent beneficial interest, the transfer fell within the definition of an actionable claim under the Transfer of Property Act and outside sales tax on goods. The earlier contrary view was overruled prospectively.

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Issues: Whether a lottery ticket is "goods" for the purposes of sales tax law, or whether the transaction amounts only to a transfer of an actionable claim.

Analysis: The legal meaning of "sale of goods" under the Constitution and sales tax statutes was traced to the classical concept in the Sale of Goods Act, 1930, and to the constitutional extension in Article 366(29A)(a) of the Constitution of India. The Court held that the decisive inquiry is whether the subject of transfer is movable property that is not excluded as an actionable claim. A lottery ticket was held to be only a token or evidence of the purchaser's chance to win a prize, and the supposed distinction between the right to participate in the draw and the right to claim the prize was rejected as artificial. The right conferred by the ticket was treated as a conditional or contingent beneficial interest in movable property not in the purchaser's possession, bringing it within the definition of an actionable claim under Section 3 of the Transfer of Property Act, 1882 and outside the sales tax concept of "goods".

Conclusion: A lottery ticket is not goods for sales tax purposes; the transfer is at the highest a transfer of an actionable claim, and the earlier view to the contrary was overruled prospectively.

Ratio Decidendi: Where the true subject of transfer is only a conditional or contingent claim to a benefit not in the purchaser's possession, the transaction is an actionable claim and not a sale of goods liable to sales tax.

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