TaxTMI 
TaxTMI 
2014 (9) TMI 305
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....p entities situated in Finland, Sweden, Norway, Ireland, Switzerland, Italy, France, Singapore, U.K., Germany, China, Philippines and United Arab Emirates in respect of the products manufactured by the foreign entities. The said agreement envisaged that, when acting as a distributor, the appellant will sell in its own name and at on its own account the product of the foreign supplier, and that while acting as an agent, the appellant will solicit customers and promote the sale and services of the products manufactured by the foreign entities and the appellant will also assist in the preparation of any product sale contract between the foreign entity and the Indian buyer and also in the collection of sale proceeds. For these services rendered, the appellant was entitled to receive a commission in accordance with the said agreement. The products covered by the agreement were such as 2/4 stroke engines, domain spare parts, propulsion spare parts, boiler parts and so on and the commission ranged from 5% to 16% of the net sale value. Once the purchase orders were placed by the buyer in India through the appellant to the foreign entity, the goods were supplied directly by the foreign enti....
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....gn exchange. Inasmuch as the appellant has received the consideration in convertible foreign exchange and foreign inward remittance certificates are available evidencing exports, the appellant was eligible for the benefit of Notification 21/2003-ST. The same exemption would apply in respect of services rendered during 01/04/2004 to 14/03/2005 in view of Notification 21/2003. For the period from 15/03/2005 to 18/04/2006, the services provided by the appellant amounted to exports in terms of Export of Service Rules, 2005. The condition required to be satisfied to qualify as exports were - (1) the service should have been provided and used in or in relation to commerce or industry; and (2) the recipient should be located outside India. In appellant's case, these conditions are satisfied and therefore, no service tax liability would accrue for this period. For the period 01/04/2006 to 31/03/2007, the activity undertaken by the appellant would continue to be exports under Export of Service Rules. The conditions required to be satisfied to qualify as exports was (i) recipient should be located outside India; (ii) such services are delivered outside India and used outside India; (iii)....
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....merited classification under 'Business Auxiliary Services' under Section 65 (105)(zzb) read with Section 65 (19) of the Finance Act, 1994. In the said case it was held that since the foreign entity did not have any branch or business establishment in India, the service in relation to procurement of goods being provided by the appellant are entirely meant for the foreign entity and the services in question, namely, BAS was covered by Rule 3(1)(iii) of the Export Service Rules and the transaction has to be treated as delivered outside India and used outside India and since the payments for the services rendered have been received in convertible foreign exchange, the same would have to be treated as export of services. The said decision was followed by the Tribunal in the case of Alpine Modular Interiors (P) Ltd. vs. Commissioner of Service Taxi (Adjudication), New Delhi decided vide final order No. 51290/2014 dated 13/03/2014.. In the said decision, it was noted that the service of valuation of market trends and identifying of prospective customers in India for the overseas entity for modular furniture business, for which consideration was received in convertible foreign exchange....
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....r 'On-line Information and Database Access and/or Retrieval Service', it is submitted that since software has been imported into India through internet, it would amount to 'On-line Information and Database Access and/or Retrieval Service' and hence liable to service tax accordingly. 5. We have carefully considered the various submissions made by both the sides. 5.1 We notice that, for the period 01/07/2003 to 14/03/2005, since the consideration for the services rendered has been received in convertible foreign exchange, the same is exempt from tax under Notification 21/2003-ST dated 20/11/2003 and also in terms of the Board's Circular No. 56/5/2003-ST dated 25/04/2003 and, therefore, the liability to pay service tax will not arise at all. For the period after 15/03/2005 till 31/03/2008, the appellant has satisfied the conditions of export with regard to the business auxiliary services under Rule 3(1)(iii) of the Export of Service Rules and the said service has been rendered in relation to commerce and industry. The service recipient is situated outside India and the consideration for the provision of service has been received in convertible foreign exchange. Thus, the....