Common parlance test governs tariff classification of medicaments; revenue must prove consumer understanding for reclassification.

Tariff classification of turmeric skin cream and vajradanti toothpaste and tooth powder turns on common parlance, not scientific or technical meaning alone. The Supreme Court stated that previous authority did not impose rigid universal tests requiring sale only on prescription or through chemists before a product can qualify as a medicament. The revenue retained the burden to prove, with reliable evidence of consumer understanding, that the products were understood as cosmetics or toilet preparations. The show-cause notices were founded on a mistaken view of the governing test, and the factual basis relied on was insufficient to displace the assessee's Chapter 30 classification.

---

---

Issues: Whether the respondent's products, turmeric skin cream and vajradanti toothpaste and tooth powder, were classifiable under Chapter 30 as pharmaceutical products or under Chapter 33 as cosmetics/toilet preparations.

Analysis: Classification under the tariff depends on the popular or common parlance understanding of the product and not on scientific or technical meaning alone. A previous decision did not lay down rigid universal tests that products must be sold on prescription or only through chemists before they can be treated as medicaments. The burden remained on the revenue to show that the products were understood by consumers as cosmetics or toilet preparations. The show-cause notices proceeded on a misapprehension of the governing tests, and the factual basis relied upon could not sustain the proposed reclassification.

Conclusion: The products were not held classifiable under Chapter 33 on the basis urged by the department, and the assessee's classification under Chapter 30 was not displaced.

Ratio Decidendi: For tariff classification, the decisive test is how the product is understood in common parlance, and the burden lies on the revenue to establish a different classification by reliable evidence of consumer understanding.

---