TaxTMI 
TaxTMI 
2009 (12) TMI 858
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....m Gurgaon (Haryana) to different places in the North-Eastern States including the State of Mizoram as an approved carrier of M/s. Maruti Udyog Limited, Gurgaon (Haryana). According to it, the trailer carrying such Maruti vehicles from Gurgaon (Haryana) to the destination as above located in the States of Meghalaya, Nagaland, Manipur, Tripura, Mizoram and Arunachal Pradesh have to cross the territory of Assam through the Damra check-post of the Taxation Department of the State of Assam, at Srirampur which is the entry point for such vehicles. To facilitate the transit, the driver or the person in charge of the vehicle obtains a transit pass from the Superintendent of Taxes, Damra check-post, Srirampur at the entry point under section 46(15)(a) of the Act and is supposed to surrender the said document at the entry checkpost within thirty days of the date of issue thereof after obtaining necessary endorsement from the concerned authority of the exit check-post of the State of Assam as a proof of movement of the vehicle outside Assam. In terms of section 46(15)(d) a presumption that the vehicles had been sold within the State of Assam is available in law in case such a transit pass is....
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....territory of Assam and delivered to the authorised dealer M/s. H.D. Motors, Aizwal, Mizoram and thereafter sold in the State of Mizoram neither the impugned assessment nor the decision of the revisional authority is sustainable in law and is liable to be annulled in the interest of justice. Mr. Joshi has additionally contended that the impugned assessment and the decision of the revisional authority are apparently flawed, inter alia, for the non-consideration of the documentary evidence produced by the petitioner in support of its stand that the consignments concerned had exited from the State of Assam, delivered in the State of Mizoram, sold there and due taxes therefor had been realised. In support of his contentions the learned senior counsel has placed reliance on the decision of the apex court in State of Kerala v. M.M. Mathew [1978] 42 STC 348, Sodhi Transport Co. v. State of U.P. [1986] 62 STC 381 and of this court in Assam Oil Company Limited v. Commissioner of Taxes [1991] 81 STC 37. Mr. Saikia, the learned Standing Counsel, Revenue Department, in reply has questioned at the threshold the maintainability of the instant petition on the ground of non-exhaustion of the alter....
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....concerned was not shut out from producing reliable evidence that the goods had not been actually sold inside the State, but disposed of in a different way and that it is only where the presumption is not successfully rebutted that the authorities concerned were required to rely upon the rule of presumption. The decision in State of Kerala v. M.M. Mathew [1978] 42 STC 348 (SC) has been pressed into service to underline that strong suspicion, strange co-incidence and grave doubts cannot take the place of legal proof. There is no wrangle at the Bar that the legal presumption enshrined in section 46(15)(d) is rebuttable by adducing reliable and dependable evidence to the contrary and thus cannot be considered to be in absolute terms to empower the concerned revenue authority to impose tax as well as penalty without affording a reasonable opportunity to the dealer, transporter, etc., of producing such testimony. The documents relied upon on behalf of the petitioner in course of the arguments are- (1) A certificate dated February 24, 2001 issued on behalf of M/s. H.B. Motors, Aizawl certifying that the consignments named therein had been transported from Maruti Udyog Limited, Gurgoan (....
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....rengte Taxation check-post, Mizoram. It however, did not accept the same in absence of any entry in the movement register of vehicles at the exit check-post. The revisional authority, as the impugned order dated September 12, 2008 would reveal, did not make any endeavour to scrutinise the documents furnished by the petitioner, though admittedly the same had been placed before it. These documents, it is submitted at the Bar include those as alluded hereinabove. The documents relied upon on behalf of the petitioner before this court, though reveal inconsistencies in the matter of description of the consignments, the certificate of the Superintendent of Taxes, Aizawl, North Zone, per se cannot be disregarded in absence of any material that the same is a yield of extraneous or impertinent considerations. Be that as it may, these documents taken together do not unmistakably rule out the possibility of correctness of the stand of the petitioner, if appropriately reconciled to the satisfaction of the revenue authorities of the State. The underlying purpose/objective of section 46(15)(d), as a whole being to prevent evasion of tax subject however to reasonable opportunity to the person c....