TaxTMI 
TaxTMI 
2020 (1) TMI 886
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....writ petitions is common. The petitioner is a registered dealer and runs a photo studio in Trichirappalli. The petitioner takes digital photo prints without using photographic films, transfer such images to the computer and prints the same with the assistance of a computer and printer, into prints. 3. According to the petitioner, its activities fall within the ambit of "photographic services" and the petitioner is assessed to service tax as "works contract" under the provisions of the Finance Act, 1994. 4. While this is so, the petitioner received notices under the provisions of the Tamil Nadu Value Added Tax Act, 2006 (in short, "the Act") for the periods in question calling upon it to show cause why the turnover not be subjected to VAT.....
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....ns have been filed. 8. Heard Mr. Baktha Siromoni, learned counsel for the petitioner and Mrs.J. Padmavathy Devi, learned Special Government Pleader appearing on behalf of the respondents. 9. The issue before me concerns taxability of turnover received from the services rendered by the petitioner in regard to digital photography. Courts have consistently settled the position that the activity carried in this regard would only amount to a "contract of skill and labour" and not a "contract of sale". 10. The first judgment on this issue is that of the Full Bench of the Supreme Court in the case of B. C. Kame [1977] 39 STC 237 (SC) wherein the Bench, after extracting a paragraph from "sale of goods" by P. S. Atiyah noticing that the distincti....
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....ion, is essentially one of skill and labour. A good photograph reveals not only the aesthetic sense and artistic faculty of the photographer, but it also reflects his skill and labour. A good photograph in most cases is indeed a thing of beauty. It not only seeks to mirror and port ray a sene from actual life, but it also catches and preserves for the future what belongs to and is a part of the fleeting moment. The ravage brought about by the passage of time, the decay and the ageing process which inevitably set in as the years roll by leave what is pre-served in the photograph unaffected. It is no wonder that an old photograph revives nostalgic memories of days no more, but to which we look back through the mist of time with fondness even ....