2020 (12) TMI 698

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....viding the taxable services falling under the category of 'Advertising Agency Service', 'Other Taxable Service other than the 119 listed' etc., as defined under Section 65 of the Finance Act, 1994. In this case, the appellant had entered into an agreement dated 02.01.2017 with M/s Apple & Orange Pictures Limited, United Kingdom (for short, referred to as "M/s Apple & Orange") for engaging the services of the appellant to perform all line production services in accordance with the Indian Production schedule for the movie 'JUDWAA 2'. The appellant availed Cenvat credit of service tax paid on various input services used/utilized for providing the taxable output service. The appellant did not discharge the service tax....

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.... the film 'JUDWAA 2' was completed/released in India and thus, under the provisions of Rule 8 of the Place of Provision of Service Rules, 2012, such place of provision of service should be considered as India inasmuch as upon release of the film, the same was consumed in India; (b) that as per information available in the Internet Movie Database (IMD), the producer of the film has been shown as Mr. Sajid Nadiadwala, the line producers as Mr. Ronak Motla and Mr. Sudipto Sarkar and that since the name of M/s Apple & Orange does not appear in the entire scenario, it has to be construed that the said film has been produced by an Indian entity. 1.3 The impugned order has also referred to and relied upon the report submitted b....

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....enefit. According to the department, the provisions of Rule 8 of the Place of Provision of Services Rules, 2012 should be applicable for determination of the location of actual provision of service, which is India; as against the claim of the appellant that its case should be governed under Rule 3 ibid and as such, provision of service to the overseas entity should be considered as 'export'. The competing entries in the service tax statute are extracted herein below: "Rule 3. Place of provision generally The place of provision of a service shall be the location of the recipient of service : PROVIDED that in case [of service the location of the service receiver is not available in the ordinary course of bus....

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....llants name, but the same shall be fully assignable to M/s Apple & Orange, meaning thereby that the said overseas entity has been vested with the clear title in and to the filming of 'JUDWAA 2'. Thus, under the facts and circumstances of the case, it cannot be said that the beneficiary from the movie is an Indian entity i.e. the appellant herein inasmuch as the sole rights of the movie belong to M/s Apple & Orange (an overseas entity) and the appellant is only charged with the task of carrying the production activities of the film for a specific consideration. 6. I have also perused the IMDB website clipping made available in annexure-9 to the appeal memorandum, providing the information that the shooting of the movie had also be....

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.... framed under the Place of Provision of Services Rules, 2012, I find that the case of the appellant will not be governed under Rule 4 to Rule 12 itemized therein. Rather, the place of provision of service will more appropriately be categorized under Rule 3 ibid inasmuch as the service recipient has its business establishment in United Kingdom and thus, the place of provision of service is outside India, which would be considered as export of service for grant of refund of service tax paid on the input services. The department has also accepted the impugned transactions as export of service, which is evident from the fact that no proceedings were initiated against the appellant for demand of service tax on the activities undertaken by it.....