TaxTMI 
TaxTMI 
2017 (9) TMI 788
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....ine information and database access or retrieval services" w.e.f. 16.7.2001. The appellant neither themselves registered nor paid service tax. Therefore show cause notice dt. 24.4.2007 was issued to the appellants alleging evasion of service tax amounting to Rs. 34,45,770/- for rendering online information and database access or retrieval services, as per agreement dt.12.10.2000 during the period October 2001 to March 2006 (Service Tax Rs. 14,31,312/-) and for rendering Business Auxiliary Service as per agreement dt. 16.10.2003 during the period from 14.5.2003 to 31.3.2005 (Service Tax Rs. 20,14,458/-). The adjudicating authority has passed Order-in-Original confirming the proposed demand of service tax. Being aggri....
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....nt in the present matter is only engaged in providing a platform for facilitating e-commerce trading facility and not in rendering OIDAR services wherein the subscription/membership fee was being recovered only for purpose of providing access to the trading floor through a login ID/password and not for the purpose of providing access to any online information or database access or retrieval services as has been contended by the Revenue. Therefore, Circular No. B11/1/01-TRU dated 09.07.2001 is squarely applicable to the facts of the present case, wherein it has been clarified that e-commerce transactions are not leviable to Service Tax under the head of online information data-base or retrieval services. As has been c....
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.... respondent with regard to such trading are getting margin from sale and purchase. Hence the service of the respondent is clearly of e-commerce in respect of steel products. Therefore it merits classification as e-commerce service and not online information or database access or retrieval services. As regard the demand under Business Auxiliary Service the respondent has claimed Notification No. 13/2003 which was extended by the Ld. Commissioner (Appeals). In the Revenue's appeal also the benefit was not denied however the only prayer is that demand under Business Auxiliary Service is sustainable for the period from 9.7.2004 onwards. The respondent in their submission has clearly stated that the respondent is discharging the serv....
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....ffered by them. If at all they do, service tax will be payable on the amount charged for providing the information." 9. Further, the Hon'ble Supreme Court in the case of All India Federation of Tax Practices (supra), inter alia, has observed as under: 19. The importance of the above judgment of this Court is twofold. Firstly, applying the principle of equivalence, there is no difference between production or manufacture of saleable goods and production of marketable/saleable services in the form of an activity undertaken by the service provider for consideration, which correspondingly stands consumed by the service receiver. It is this principle of equivalence which is in-built into the concept of service....
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....emphasis supplied)". 10. In the instant case, there is nothing on record to show that the appellants have charged their customers for providing the online information. In fact the entire narration given in the Show Cause Notice only supports the argument of the Appellants that they were engaged in the e-commerce trading and that their activity could not be considered as providing "online information and database access or retrieval services". On surfing of the Appellants' website it can be seen that it claims as under: "Click For Steel Services Limited (CFS) is an Essar Group company which pr....
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....meption under Notification No.13/2003-ST dated 20.06.2003 even if they were considered as "commission agents". I do not find any logic in the findings of the lower adjudicating authority that. Merely because the services were available only to clientele consisting of validated members who were allowed access through login ID, it can be not be said that the services were not open to all as long as there was no registration fee. Moreover, this cannot be a reason for denying the Appellants the benefit provided under the said notification. Accordingly I set aside demand of Service Tax on the charge of rendering of the Business Auxiliary Services against Appellants as they, themselves, have paid Service Tax from April 200....