TaxTMI 
TaxTMI 
1985 (7) TMI 342
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....edy provided under the Act first before invoking the jurisdiction of this Court under article 226 of the Constitution. 2.. The appellant challenged in the writ petition an order of the respondent dated 19th July, 1979, passed under section 16 of the Tamil Nadu General Sales Tax Act, 1959 (hereinafter called "the Act"). 3.. The facts relating to the matter briefly are the following: 4.. The petitioner is a dealer in hides and skins and as such used to purchase raw hides and skins from various places in the State of Tamil Nadu and process the same into dressed hides and skins and thereafter used to sell locally as well as outside. For the assessment year 1973-74, the appellant was finally assessed on a total and taxable turnovers of ....
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....ng with hides and skins. Items 7(a) and 7(b) of the Second Schedule to the Act at the relevant time read as follows: --------------------------------------------------------------------------- "S. No. Description of goods Point of levy Rate of tax (per cent.) (1) (2) (3) (4) --------------------------------------------------------------------------- 7(a) Raw hides and skins At the point of 3 last purchase in the State. 7(b) Dressed hides and At the point of 1½." skins (which were first sale in the not subjected to tax State. under this Act as raw hides and skins). --------------------------------------------------------------------------- One other factor to be noted is that the Revenue was levying the tax on the....
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....e under item 7(b). The respondent on the basis of this judgment of the Supreme Court has taken the view that the original assessment was not in conformity with the subsequent judgment of the Supreme Court and, therefore, the original assessment requires revision. 8.. The proceedings under section 16 of the Act were resisted substantially on the basis of the judgment of this Court in L.M.S. Sadak Thamby & Co. v. Appellate Assistant Commissioner of Commercial Taxes [1969] 24 STC 468. Even in the affidavit filed in support of the writ petition and the memorandum of grounds in the writ appeal, the contentions are raised based on the said judgment only. 9.. Mr. G. Narayanan, learned counsel appearing for the appellant, fairly conceded that....
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....kthavatsalam, learned Additional Government Pleader, submitted that the learned Judge was right in dismissing the writ petition directing the appellant to exhaust the effective alternative remedies available under the Act. He also contended that the respondent was well within his jurisdiction in reopening the assessment on the basis of the judgment of the Supreme Court which is subsequent to the original assessment. He placed reliance on a Division Bench judgment of this Court reported in Bava Prima Tannery v. State of Tamil Nadu [1981] 47 STC 7 and also an unreported judgment of the Division Bench in T.C. No. 569 of 1982 (Hazarath Trading Co. v. State of Tamil Nadu, represented by the Commercial Tax Officer, Periamet Assessment Circle). ....
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.... Trading Co. v. State of Tamil Nadu). Ramanujam, J., speaking for the Bench has held as follows: "Thus, the scheme of items 7(a) and 7(b) to the Second Schedule of the State Act is that when raw hides and skins are purchased locally in the State, the levy of tax would be 3 per cent and when the same goods are tanned and sold inside the State as dressed hides and skins, no levy would be made on such sale as those hides and skins have already been subjected to local tax at 3 per cent when they are purchased in raw form. From the mere fact that the assessee considers that the assessment on the sale of dressed hides and skins is beneficial to him, it cannot be said that once the assessment is made on the dressed hides and skins, the tax cann....
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....that except projecting the scope of section 16(1)(b), no other point was placed before the learned judges and therefore they had no occasion to consider the other aspects, particularly in the light of the Supreme Court decision referred to above. On the other hand, the Division Bench judgment of this Court, relied on by the learned Additional Government Pleader, in T.C. No. 569 of 1982 (Hazarath Trading Co. v. State of Tamil Nadu) deals with the matter elaborately and has also considered the scope of the Division Bench judgment of this Court in Deputy Commissioner of Commercial Taxes v. Devandran & Co. [1981] 47 STC 264. While referring to the judgment of this Court in Deputy Commissioner of Commercial Taxes v. Devandran & Co. [1981] 47 STC....