2007 (10) TMI 599

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....y, Texas, U.S.A., for a sum of Rs. 2,23,52,625. The said vehicle reached the petitioner through Chennai Port. It was cleared by customs authorities as no custom was levied. The petitioner approached the Regional Transport Officer, Kakinada, for registration of the said vehicle under the Motor Vehicles Registration Act. The said authority directed the petitioner to obtain and file clearance certificate from first respondent for entry tax. Accordingly the petitioner approached the first respondent by its letter dated July 14, 2003 and the first respondent computed the amount of entry tax payable by the petitioner at Rs. 27,90,468. The amount was paid, according to the petitioner, under protest by a letter on December 19, 2003. Subsequently th....

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....d. The facts are not in dispute, but the respondents have asserted that since Entry Tax Act does not provide for any interest on refunds, the petitioner was not entitled to any interest. Besides, the amount deposited by the petitioner was neither deposited as a result of any assessment nor was any demand made by the Commercial Tax Department. The amount was deposited by the petitioner voluntarily on his own. Therefore, even if the Interest Act, 1978 applied in such situations, it would not apply to the present case as the amount had been deposited by the petitioner on his own volition. In the light of these assertions, it is necessary to go through certain documents which are on record. The petitioner wrote a letter on July 14, 2003 to t....

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....writ petition was decided. In this view of the matter, whether the petitioner would be entitled to any interest or not would have to be seen in the context of the law laid by various courts. In this case, reference can be made to a judgment of this court reported in Gulbanu Razack v. Assistant Commissioner of Income-tax (Investigation) [1990] 186 ITR 226 and judgment of the Supreme Court reported in State of Punjab v. Atul Fasteners Ltd. [2007] 7 VST 278 which is directly on the point. The Supreme Court held that the interest is admissible in a tax enactment on the grounds "agreement" and "statutory provision", but interest cannot be granted on the basis of equity under a tax enactment. Coming to the Interest Act, 1978 on which reliance ....

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....her party may exert influence or pressure upon the other, take selfish advantage of his trust, or deal with the subject-matter of the trust in such a way as to benefit himself or prejudice the other except in the exercise of the utmost good faith and with the full knowledge and consent of that other . . . Examples of fiduciary relations are those existing between attorney and client, guardian and ward, principal and agent, executor and heir, trustee and cestui que trust, landlord and tenant, etc." In the light of the definitions of the fiduciary relationship it is clear that either the amount should have been paid in a trust or relationship should have been result of confidence by one side on the other or by domination or influence by on....