1975 (5) TMI 75

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.....V. Rangam and Miss A. Subhashini, Advocates, with him), for the appellants.   --------------------------------------------------   The judgment of the Court was delivered by   GUPTA, J.-These twelve appeals arise out of a common judgment of the Madras High Court disposing of the writ petitions filed by the respondents in which they challenged certain orders of the assessing authority under the Madras General Sales Tax Act, 1959, proposing to redetermine the taxable turnover of the respondents by including the sale price of foreign liquor which, it was alleged, had escaped assessment. The High Court directed the sales tax authorities not to include in the assessable turnover the tax paid by the respondents under s....

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....treated as part of their total turnover. Section 21-A, so far as it is relevant for the present purpose, is in these terms: "Every person or institution which sells foreign liquor- (a).................................... (b).................................... shall collect from the purchaser and pay over to the Government at such intervals and in such manner as may be prescribed, a sales tax calculated at the rate of eight annas in the rupee, or at such other rate as may be notified by the Government from time to time, on the price of the liquor so sold." Counsel for the appellants contended relying on several decisions of this court to which we shall presently refer, that the amounts collected by the assessees by way of sal....

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...."turnover", which is similar to the definition of the term in the Madras General Sales Tax Act, 1959. The position was further explained in Delhi Cloth and General Mills Co. Ltd. v. Commissioner of Sales Tax, Indore [1971] 28 S.T.C. 331 (S.C.); [1971] Supp. S.C.R. 945., which was a case under the Madhya Pradesh General Sales Tax Act, 1958. The relevant provisions of this Act appear to be similar to those of the Madras General Sales Tax Act, 1959. Stating that the liability to pay tax under the Act is that of the dealer, Hegde, J., speaking for the court said that the Act did not confer "any statutory power on the dealer to collect sales tax as such from any class of buyers...... Unless the price of an article is controlled, it is always ....