1984 (4) TMI 269

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.... was charged on the sale of bread. On appeal the Deputy Commissioner (Appeals), Commercial Taxes, Jodphur, set aside the assessment. The revision was also dismissed and that had led to the present reference. Section 3(1)(a) of the Rajasthan Sales Tax Act, 1954 (No. XXIX of 1954) (for short "the Act" herein) as it stood at the relevant time is as under: "3. Incidence of taxation.-(1) Subject to the provisions of this Act every dealer whose turnover in the previous year in respect of sales or supplies of goods exceeds- (a) in the case of a dealer who imports goods, or manufactures any goods other than cooked food or deals in cereals and pulses in any of their forms......... ...............Rs. 5,000." According to it dealer could import g....

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....d therefore, the benefit of lower rate of tax given to cooked food including sweetmeats and confectionery other than that sold in sealed or tinned containers by Notification No. ST-3128/X-1012(4)-1965 dated 1st July, 1966 issued under the U.P. Sales Tax Act, 1948 is not available to biscuits. P.V. Dixit, C.J., speaking for the Division Bench held in Commissioner of Sales Tax v. Ballabhadas Ishwardas [1968] 21 STC 309 that in common parlance cooked food means those things which one eats at regular meal hours. It was observed that biscuit is no doubt a kind of food if the term is understood in a very wide sense and the process of baking involved in the manufacture of biscuits is no doubt a form of cooking, but it is not "cooked food" which o....

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....been defined as "a food made of a dough of flour or meal from grain with added liquid shortening and a leavening agent, the dough being kneeded, shared, allowed to rise and baked"; a loaf biscuit or cake or sweetened bread dough enriched with eggs and fruit"; "a loaf roll or portion of bread" and "bread made from flours other than these of cereals". In common parlance when we call bread or its slices, we refer to the bread as bakery product. The expression "cooked food" has not been defined in the Act. It must be construed as understood in common parlance. It must be given popular sense meaning "that sense which people conversant with the subject-matter with which the statute is dealing would attribute to it". Reference may usefully be mad....