AI Drafter 
TaxTMI 
TaxTMI 
2022 (4) TMI 1511
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....um of Rs. 6,87,13,119/- received by the Appellant from its customer in India is in the nature of 'royalty' within the meaning of section 9(1)(vi) of the IT Act and accordingly taxable in India under the IT Act. 3. The lower authorities erred in holding that a sum of Rs. 6,87,13,119/- received by the Appellant from its customer in India is in the nature of 'royalty' within the meaning of Article 12(3) of the Double Taxation Avoidance Agreement (to which the Appellant is entitled to) and accordingly taxable in India under the IT Act. 4. The lower authorities erred in holding that the sum received by the Appellant is in respect of services utilised for the purpose of making or earning income from a source outside India. 5. The lower authorities erred in holding that the Appellant failed to produce evidences before them. 6. The lower authorities erred in holding that the retrospective amendment to section 9(1)(vi) of the IT Act would apply in interpreting the Article 12(3) of the Double Taxation Avoidance Agreement between India and Belgium. 7. Without prejudice, the lower authorities erred in holding that the tax determined ....
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....eceived by assessee cannot be considered neither to be 'royalty' under section 9(1)(v) r.w.Expl. 5 & 6, nor Fee for technical services under section 9(1)(vii) or the Act. It submitted that even as per the DTAA the amount cannot be taxable unless there is a usage of secret formula by the Hutch. The DRP vide order dated 02.03.2017 upheld the sums received by the assessee from Hutch as royalty and taxable in India, u/s.9(1)(vi) of the Act as well as under Article 12 of the India Belgium DTAA relying on Explanation 5 and 6 to section 9(1)(vi) of the Act which has retrospective effect. The DRP did not decide the applicability of section 9(1)(vii) of the act considering it to be academic in nature. 4. On receipt of the DRP directions, the Ld.AO passed the final assessment order dated 30.10.2017 and held the assessee to be taxable in India. Aggrieved by the final assessment order passed by the Ld.AO, the assessee is in appeal before this Tribunal. 5. Before this Tribunal the assessee raised additional ground vide application dated 16/11/2021, raising following issue: Additional ground of appeal:- "1. That the payments received by the assessee cannot be treated a....
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.... 195 of the Act. The Ld.Counsel submitted that, there is a categorical observation by this Tribunal in Vodafone South Ltd. vs. DDIT(supra), that the view taken therein will not apply to the substantive assessment proceedings of assessee as the applicability of DTAA would have to be examined. He submitted that the decision in Vodafone South Ltd. vs. DDIT(supra) was not concerned with the interpretation of DTAA. It is also the submission of the Ld.Counsel that assessee was not a party to the dispute in case of Vodafone South Ltd. vs. DDIT(supra) and therefore the view taken in Vodafone South Ltd. vs. DDIT(supra) would not be ipso facto applicable to the present assessee. 7. The Ld.Counsel submitted that the view taken by authorities below is therefore entirely based on the amendment made to section 9(1)(vi) of the Act by introduction of Explanation 5 and Explanation 6 by 2012. He submitted that prior to 2012, the Delhi High Court in Asia Telecommunications Co. Ltd. vs. DIT reported in (2011) 332 ITR 340 held that for a payment to be regarded as 'royalty' under the IT Act or under the DTAA, there has to "use" of the intellectual property by the payer. It is submitted that the Expla....
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....Equipment, while the definition under the IT Act cover such consideration for use of ICS equipment. 9. The Ld.Counsel submitted that this Tribunal while considering the issue in case of Vodafone South Ltd. vs. DDIT(supra), relied on the decision of Hon'ble Madras High Court in case of Verizon Communications Singapore Pte.Ltd. vs. ITO reported in (2014) 361 ITR 575, to hold that the consideration paid by Vodaforn South, falls within the ambit of 'process' and therefore amounts to Royalty as per Explanation 5 &6 to section 9(1)(vi) of the Act. He submitted that in a later decision of Hon'ble Delhi High Court in case of DDIT vs.New Skies Satellite BV reported in (2016) 68 taxmann.com 8 has held that the judgment in case of Verizon Communications Singapore Pte.Ltd. vs. ITO(supra) does not reflect the correct law on interpretation of DTAA. 10. The Ld.Counsel placed reliance on following observation by Hon'ble Delhi High Court in case of DDIT vs.New Skies Satellite BV(supra): "31. In a judgment by the Madras High Court in Verizon Communications Singapore Pte Ltd v. ITO, International Taxation [2014] 361 ITR 575, the Court held the Explanations to be applicable to not only ....
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....8 expressed this position in the following words: "101. Also, any ruling on the more expansive language contained in the explanations to section 9(1)(vi) of the Income Tax Act would have to be ignored if it is wider and less beneficial to the assessee than the definition contained in the DTAA, as per section 90(2) of the Income Tax Act read with explanation 4 thereof, and Article 3(2) of the DTAA."" 27.4. It is also relatively well settled that definition in the domestic law or amendment thereto cannot apply to interpretation terms of a DTAA. Particularly when there is a definition of that term in the treaty. The Bombay High Court in Siemens Aktiongesellschaft observed as under in this regard: "....... by an unilateral amendment it is not possible for one nation which is party to an agreement to tax income which otherwise was not subject to tax. Such income would not be subject to tax under the expression "laws in force". ..." 27.5. The Delhi High Court in New Skies Satellite BV, after quoting the Bombay High Court further explained the principle in the following words: "41. This Court is of the view that no amendment to the Act, whether....
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.... 4 FINANCIAL TERMS 4.1 Any prices and service areas for the Carrier Services is mentioned in Annex A. A Party may alter, withdraw, adjust or modify the prices or service areas for the Carrier Service it supplies at any time during the term of this Agreement with seven CSA/Main Body/Confidential (7) days advance notice to the other Party. The Parties may notify each other of any such modifications to their respective prices / service areas by an electronic message In case there is a failure in electronic message service or delivery failure of the sent electronic message then the notifying party shall notify the same through fax. Similarly the other Party shall acknowledge their acceptance of such new prices by an electronic message. In case there is a failure in electronic message service or delivery failure of the sent electronic message then the other party shall send their acceptance through fax. If the receiving Party does not confirm acceptance as aforesaid within seven (7) days from the receipt of the first transmittal, and continues to send traffic, such Party's consent to such new prices / service areas shall be deemed given, Further, if at any point of time the....
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....vi) of the Act, and also holds that the payment to assessee are in the nature of "Fee for Technical Services" in terms of Section 9(1)(vii) of the Act. He submitted that the DRP only adjudicated objection raised by assessee in respect of the payments being 'Royalty', but left the objection regarding payment to be FTS as academic in nature. 14. The Ld.Counsel taxability of services fees received by assessee submitted as under: I Whether payment received by assessee could be considered as Royalty as per section 9(1)(vi) read with Explanation 2, 5 & 6 of the Act ? The Ld.AO and DRP held the payment received to be 'Royalty' as they are of the view that there is use of process by Hutch in terms of Section 9(1)(vi) of the Act, r.w.Expl. 5 & 6. The term "Process" occurs under clause (i), (ii) and (iii) to Explanation 2 to Section 9(vi). It reads as under:- 'Explanation 2.: For the purposes of this clause, "royalty" means consideration (including any lump sum consideration but excluding any consideration which would be the income of the recipient chargeable under the head "Capital gains") for- (i) the transfer of all or any rights (including the granting o....
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....r property constituting different forms of literary and artistic property, the elements of intellectual property specified in the text and information concerning industrial, commercial or scientific experience. The definition applies to payments for the use of, or the entitlement to use, rights of the kind mentioned, whether or not they have been, or are required, registered in a public register. The definition covers both payments made under a license and compensation which a person would be obliged to pay for fraudulently copying or infringing the right." 17. He thus submitted that the word "process" must also refer to specie of intellectual property, applying the rule of, ejusdem generis or noscitur a sociis, as held by Hon'ble Supreme Court in case of CIT vs.Bharti Cellular reported in (2011) 330 ITR 239. The Ld. Counsel relied on the following observation by Hon'ble Madras High Court in case of CIT vs. Neyveli Lignite Corpn. Ltd. (supra). "10.The term (royalty' normally connotes the payment made to a person who has exclusive right over a thing for allowing another to make use of that thing which may be either physical or intellectual property or thing. The excl....
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....nation does not do away with the requirement of successful exclusivity of the right in respect of such process being with the person claiming 'royalty' for granting its usage to a third party. 20. The Ld.Counsel contended that reliance placed by the authorities below on decision in case of Verizon Communications Singapore Pvt. Ltd. v. ITO(supra) is misplaced. We have gone through facts of of Verizon Communications Singapore Pvt. Ltd. v. ITO(supra). He submitted that in that case, the Indian payer company obtained 'leased lines' on hire basis under a contract from non-resident Verizon Communication. When an Indian company takes leased line on hire, then it can be said that it had 'used' it as observed by Hon'ble Madras High Court therein. He submitted that in present facts of the case, the assessee has neither leased nor has given on hire its network to Hutch. Therefore it cannot be said that Hutch has 'used' the network belonging to assessee. Therefore, reliance of the Ld.AO on the said case law is factually distinguishable. 21. He referred to the commentary form Prof. Klaus Vogel's Commentary on Double Taxation Convention, wherein 'Secrete....
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....order the Tribunal has held in the context of the provisions of clause (iii) of Explanation 2 below section 9(1)(vi), that a "process" is involved when the signals that are uplinked through the earth stations to the transponder get converted into different frequencies and fit for being down-linked via earth stations over the footprint area. It was therefore held that the payment was for the use of a "process" and hence royalty within the meaning of the aforesaid clause. The clause reads as follows : "(iii) the use of any patent, invention, model, design, secret formula or process or trademark or similar property;" It was not disputed before us on behalf of the assessee that the nature of the activity carried on by it is the same as in the case of Asia Satellite Telecommunication Co. Ltd. (supra). If that is so, we have to hold, respectfully following the order of the co-ordinate Bench, that there is a "process" involved in the activity carried on by the assessee before us. In Asia Satellite Telecommunication Co. Ltd.'s case (supra) it was further held that the word "secret" appearing in clause (iii) above qualifies only the word "formula" but not the word "process....
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....ret" there would have been a comma after the word "process" (by mistake mentioned in the order as "formula"). The Tribunal was thus prepared, with respect, to accept the argument that both the words "formula" and "process" can be said to be qualified by the word "secret" had the clause been drafted as under : "the use of any patent, invention, model, design, secret formula or process, or trademark or similar property" What the Tribunal has pointed out stands fulfilled in article 12.3(a) of the treaty with USA. From the article quoted above, it may be seen that there is a comma after the words "secret formula or process" which indicates that both the words "formula" and "process" are qualified by the word "secret". The requirement thus under the treaty is that both the formula and the process, for which the payment is made, should be a secret formula or a secret process in order that the consideration may be characterised as royalty. We do agree with the argument of the Special Counsel for the Department, on the strength of the several authorities cited by him, that normally punctuation by itself cannot control the interpretation of a statutory provision and in fac....
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....ocess involved in the operation of a transponder, the payment for the use of the process-assuming it to be so-does not amount to royalty. 24. The Ld. Counsel submitted that each party under the agreement remains responsible for its own network and for the provision of services related to it in its respective agreed jurisdiction. He submitted that the assessee merely delivers the call that originates on its network to one of the inter connection locations and carries and terminates the call on its network. Hutch is nowhere concerned with the route, equipment, process or network elements used by the assessee in the course of rendering such services. He further submitted that the assessee and Hutch provides connecting, transit and termination services to each other on a reciprocal basis, and neither of the parties shall have any rights in the equipments or in the network of each other. He emphasised that the charges under the agreement are also levied for the services provided under the agreement, based on the actual call duration and number of calls successfully delivered by the parties to other parties. It is thus submitted by the Ld. Counsel that the agreement are not for rentin....
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.... person, other than payments to an employee of the person making the payments and to any individual for independent personal services mentioned in Article 14, in consideration for services of a managerial, technical or consultancy nature, including the provision of services of technical or other personnel. 4. The provisions of paragraphs 1 and 2 shall not apply if the beneficial owner of the royalties or fees for technical services, being a resident of a Contracting State, carries on business in the other Contracting State in which the royalties or fees for technical services arise, through a permanent establishment situated therein, or performs in that other State independent personal services from a fixed base situated therein, and the right or property in respect of which, or the contract under which, the royalties or fees for technical services are paid is effectively connected with such permanent establishment or fixed base. In such case, the provisions of Article 7 or Article 14, as the case may be, shall apply. 5. Royalties and fees for technical services shall be deemed to arise in a Contracting State when the payer is that State itself, a political sub-di....
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....es the expression 'formula' and cannot be read before the word 'process'. On such interpretation, it is submitted by the Revenue in its comments that the services provided to the applicant are clearly in the nature of a process and not in the nature of standard facility and the applicant has used and has been conferred with the right to use such process. However, this contention has not been urged before us by the learned Counsel for the Department for the obvious reason that the language used in the relevant clause of the Treaty does not support any such interpretation. The expression in article 12(3) (referred to at para 7.1 supra) is 'for the use of or the right to use any copyright, patent, trade mark, design or model, plan, secret formula or process, or for information concerning industrial, commercial or scientific experience.' It is thus clear that formula/process are part of the same group and the adjective 'secret' governs both. The reasoning of ITAT in the aforementioned case, based on the absence of comma after process and the impact of the immediately following word, 'trade mark', does not hold good in view of the clear language i....
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....his knowledge or skill to his pupils. Technical knowledge and advice cannot be treated as capital assets. The learned advocate for the assessee next contended that the Tribunal itself had held that some of the information to be imparted by the assessee to the Indian company under the agreement would be of the nature of technical assistance and payment received, therefore, would be in the nature of fees for such assistance. In that view, there was no reason why other technical information and knowledge to be made available by the assessee to the Indian company should be treated differently and payment made, therefore, should be held to be a royalty. The learned advocate for the assessee contended last that the fact that payment was being made to the assessee by the Indian company of a fixed percentage of the net selling price of the products manufactured and sold by the Indian company would not make any difference to the quality and character of payment. The measure or method of payment cannot determine the nature of the transaction involved. 15. The learned advocate for the revenue contended on the other hand that on a proper construction of the agreement between ....
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....ad made certain improvements on a handgrenade and had obtained a number of patents in respect of such improvements. During the great war, British Government used the said invention and a large number of handgrenades were manufactured. After the end of the war, a Royal Commission was set up to deal with the question, inter alia, of payment to be made to inventors whose patent had been utilised by the Government during the war. The taxpayer received substantial payment from the Government in respect of the user, past, present and future for his patented improvements. The amount received by the taxpayer in the award was brought to tax. It was contended by the taxpayer that as the payment was being made, inter alia, for right to use the invention in the future a part of the said amount was capital receipt in his hands and could not be taxed. The matter was finally disposed of in the House of Lords. The facts found by the General Commissioners that large stocks of grenades were still in existence after manufacture and that the amount of the award attributable to future use was negligible were accepted and it was held that the taxpayer had been correctly charged to income-tax. T....
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....tion under which the taxpayer granted licences to the latter to manufacture a bomber plane which the taxpayer had designed and developed. Under all the aforesaid agreements the taxpayer agreed to impart manufacturing technique to the licensees in consideration of which the taxpayer received specified lump sum payment. On these facts it was held by the House of Lords that the payments received by the taxpayer were trading and not capital receipts. The following observations in the judgment of Viscount Redcliffe were relied on by the assessee: "There is no property right in 'know-how' that can be transferred, even in the limited sense that there is a legally protected property interest in a secret process, special knowledge or skill can indeed ripen into a form of property in the fields of commerce and industry, as in copyright, trademarks and designs and patents, and where such property is parted with for money what is received can be, but will not necessarily be, a receipt on capital account. But imparting 'know-how' for reward is not like this, any more than a teacher sells his knowledge or skill to his pupil.... The other point is that 'know-....
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.....): In this case one of the questions which arose before a Division Bench of this Court was whether know-how made available and utilised for a long period by the person to whom it was made available would constitute a permanent benefit and the consideration received for such know-how would be capital or revenue receipt. Following the decision of the House of Lords in the case of Musker ( supra), it was held that by obtaining know-how no capital asset would be acquired. The Division Bench observed as follows: ". . . Royalties, usually, are periodical payments for continuous enjoyment of certain benefits under a contract. In every case payment of royalty is not a capital expenditure. In our case the various types of payments that the assessee has to make seem to be closely related to the assessee's manufacturing processes of 'Simple' products. In other words, these payments are intimately linked up with the manufacturing activities of the assessee and not with the capital values of the assets that the assessee would require. They cannot, strictly speaking, be said to be the purchase price of these assets. It is true that the assessee's foreign principals woul....
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..... The assessee contended that what it had paid to the English company under the head 'Research contribution' were, in fact, payments of royalty and liable to deduction of tax at source at a lower rate. The revenue contended to the contrary. On these facts, it was held by a Division Bench of the Gujarat High Court that the agreement between the assessee and the English company was only for a period of 10 years and provided for exploitation of secret formulation, patent and various other rights of the English company by the assessee in India exclusively. The payment was a payment of royalty. The High Court considered the meaning of the expression 'royalty' as appearing in various dictionaries as also in foreign law on international commercial agreements. (h) CIT v. Dunlop Rubber Co. Ltd. [1983] 142 ITR 493 (Cal.): In this case the assessee was a non-resident English company and had a network of subsidiaries and associate companies all over the world. The assessee maintained technical research establishments in the U.K. from which latest information, processes and invention relating to goods manufactured by the assessee were communicated to its subsid....
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....t. In consideration of the aforesaid, the Indian company agreed to pay to the assessee-commission at a specified date to be calculated on the net selling price of the products of the assessee manufactured and sold by the Indian company during the continuance of the agreement. The question which arose was whether the amounts paid by the Indian company to the assessee by way of commission were in the nature of royalty and fees within the meaning of rule 1(ix) and rule 1( x) of the First Schedule to the Companies (Profits) Surtax Act, 1964, and were required to be excluded from the total income of the assessee in computing its chargeable profits. A Division Bench of this Court affirmed the finding of the Tribunal on these facts and held that the amounts described as commission in the agreement between the assessee and the Indian company were in the nature of royalties and fees and were entitled to the exemption provided by the said rules of the said Act. This Court considered the dictionary meaning of the terms 'royalty' and 'fee'. It was observed that the 'nomenclature' used by the parties which were not defined in the statute were required to be construed on ....
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....any would be solely for the use of the Indian company. The same would be considered as having been disclosed in confidence and would not become the property of the Indian company till such information would otherwise before public by application and user. The agreement further provided that the Indian company would take all reasonable care to keep such information supplied by the assessee as confidential and would not disclose the same to the third party. 18. It appears to us from the aforesaid provisions of the agreement that the assessee considered the information to be supplied to the Indian company by the assessee under the said agreement as exclusive and not generally available. The fact that the agreement required the Indian company not to treat the information furnished by the assessee as its own property indicates further that the assessee intended and treated the information to be supplied by it as its own property. Under the agreement the assessee would be entitled to utilise and use such information for the period of the agreement. 19. From the dictionary meaning of the term 'royalty', it appears that the said term connotes payments per....
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....industan Construction Co. Ltd's case (supra). 56. The courts have however created an exception to the general rule that punctuation is not to be looked at to ascertain meaning. That exception operates wherever a statute is carefully punctuated. Only then should weight undoubtedly be given to punctuation; CIT v. Loyal Textile Ltd. [1998] 231 ITR 573/[1997] 95 Taxman 293 (Mad.); Sama Alana Abdulla v. State of Gujarat AIR 1996 SC 569; Mohd Shabbir v. State of Maharashtra AIR 1979 SC 564; Lewis Pugh Evans Pugh v. Ashutosh Sen AIR 1929 SC 69; Ashwini Kumar Ghose v. Arbinda Bose AIR 1952 SC 369; Pope Alliance Corpn. v. Spanish River Pulp & Paper Mills Ltd. AIR 1929 PC 38 An illustration of the aid derived from punctuation may be furnished from the case of Mohd. Shabbir (supra) where Section 27 of the Drugs and Cosmetics Act, 1940 came up for construction. By this section whoever "manufactures for sale, sells, stocks or exhibits for sale or distributes" a drug without a license is liable for punishment. In holding that mere stocking shall not amount to an offence under the section, the Supreme Court pointed out the presence of comma after "manufactures for sale" and "sells"an....
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....sion services do not partake of the nature of royalty. "74. Even when we look into the matter from the standpoint of Double Taxation Avoidance Agreement (DTAA), the case of the appellant gets boost. The Organisation of Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) has framed a model of Double Taxation Avoidance Agreement (DTAA) entered into by India are based. Article 12 of the said model DTAA contains a definition of royalty which is in all material respects virtually the same as the definition of royalty contained in clause (iii) of Explanation 2 to Section 9(1) (vi) of the Act. This fact is also not in dispute. The learned counsel for the appellant had relied upon the commentary issued by the OECD on the aforesaid model DTAA and particularly, referred to the following amendment proposed by OECD to its commentary on Article 12, which reads as under: '9.1 Satellite operators and their customers (including broadcasting and telecommunication enterprises) frequently enter into transponder leasing agreements under which the satellite operator allows the customer to utilize the capacity of a satellite transponder to transmit over large geographical areas. Payments m....
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.... satellite, such as its piloting or steering, etc. were transferred to the user.' 76. Klaus Vogel has also made a distinction between letting an asset and use of the asset by the owner for providing services as below: 'On the other hand, another distinction to be made is letting the proprietary right, experience, etc., on the one hand and use of it by the licensor himself, e.g., within the framework of an advisory activity. Within the range from services', viz. outright transfer of the asset involved (right, etc.) to the payer of the royalty. The other, just as clearcut extreme is the exercise by the payee of activities in the service of the payer, activities for which the payee uses his own proprietary rights, know-how, etc., while not letting or transferring them to the payer.' 77. The Tribunal has discarded the aforesaid commentary of OECD as well as Klaus Vogel only on the ground that it is not safe to rely upon the same. However, what is ignored is that when the technical terms used in the DTAA are the same which appear in Section 9(1)(vi), for better understanding all these very terms, OECD commentary can always be relied upon. The A....
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....the date of entry into force, of the later treaty with a third country being a member of OECD, the same rate, the same exemption or the same lower tax base, automatically would apply to India and Belgium in accordance with the Treaty. 30. The relevant provision of the Protocol under India Belgium DTAA reads as under: "If under any Convention or Agreement between India and a third State being a member of the OECD which enters into force after 1st January, 1990, India limits its taxation on royalties or fees for technical services to a rate lower or a scope more restricted than the rate or scope provided for in the present Agreement on the said items of income, the same rate or scope as provided for in that Convention or Agreement on the said items of income shall also apply under the present Agreement with effect from the date from which the present Agreement or the said Convention or Agreement is effective, whichever date is later." He submitted that the above MFN clause will apply where India enters into DTAA with a third country, being an OECD member that comes into force after 01/01/1990. 31. The Ld.Counsel submitted that India entered into DTAA with Hungary, w....
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....itory. In this Article, the term "royalty" means any royalty or other like amount received as consideration for the right to use copyrights, artistic or scientific works, cinematographic films, patents, models, designs, plans, secret processes or formulae, trade marks and other like property or rights, but does not include any royalty or other like amount in respect of the operation of mines, quarries or other natural resources." The Ld.Counsel thus submitted that on the fact of the present case, on analysing the DTAA between India and Belgium DTAA rendered via protocol attached to the Tax Treaty between India Hungary rendered via Protocal attached to the Tax Treaty between Indian Greece, that the payments received by the assessee on account of Service rendered to Hutch cannot be brought to tax in view of the principle of most favoured nation (MFN) clause in the Tax Treaty unless there is a 'right to use secret process' by Hutch in India. 34. In support of the Ld.Counsel placed reliance on following decisions of International Courts: • Decision by South African High Court in case of ABC Proprietary Ltd.vs. Commissioner of South African Revenue Services, ....
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....The same is taxable under the IT Act, 1961 as well as the under India-Belgium DTAA @ 10% on the onsite software development services. As the assessee company has neither paid taxes nor had the payer made the TDS in the said case. Also it was noted by the Ld.A0 that the assessee company has not filed any return for A.Y: 2008-09. It is clear from the above that the payment received by the assessee has been held to be an income on which the payer should have deducted the tax as per law. It has been held to be Royalty as per within the meaning of section 9(1)(vi) read with explanation (2), (5) and (6). Therefore, the receipts earned by the assessee is held to be taxable as per amended by the provisions of the Act and the India- Belgium Double Taxable Avoidance Agreement. Further it is clearly held that expanded meaning of "Royalties" contained in section 9(1)(vi) of the Act as retrospectively amended by Finance Act, 2012 are only clarificatory in nature. The Hon'ble DRP held that consideration paid for use or right to use of process was already chargeable to tax as royalty. Further, the argument of the assessee that the assessee being a resident of Belgium is covered by the benefic....
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....eing heard must be granted to assessee. Accordingly, the grounds raised by assessee stands allowed for statistical purposes. In the result, the appeal filed by assessee stands allowed for statistical purposes. Order pronounced in the open court on 26th April, 2022. ============= Document 1 1. ANNEX A-PRODUCT PLAN-BUSINESS CLASS TRANSIT PSTN SERVICE Description On a non-exclusive basis, each Party agrees to provide to the other Party the connecting facility with its Network allowing the other Party to route its international outbound voice traffic in virtual transit to various foreign destinations. The type of traffic shall be PSTN traffic only. For example, manual treated calls via operators, ISDN traffic or any other type of voice & data traffic, are excluded. (This Product Plan is also referred to as "Business Class Transit PSTN Service"). 2. Pre-requisites Hutch BELG ACO MICS 2.1. Technical Connections 2.1.1 Belgacom International Carrier Services shall bear the Investment cost, the provisioning and maintenance of the connecting facility in Belgium and of its Foreign POP specified in Annex B, as well as for the ....
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....he implementation, both Technical Project Managers will agree on the technical design for the implementation of the interconnection by filling a common technical document "Technical Implementation of Interconnection between BELGACOM ICS and Hutch", including technical configuration details and contact points of both Parties for Operations & Maintenance. Both Parties will distribute this document to the respective technical teams who will be in charge of the set-up of the interconnection and its daily operation. Technical Project Leaders: 3. For Hutch: Uday JOSHI HUTCHISON ESSAR SOUTH LIMITED Phone: +91 22 666 5594 Mobile: +91 98200 18753 e-mail:[email protected] For BELGACOM ICS: Augustine CHNG Belgacom Asia Pacific/ Interconnection Projects Manager Ph: +65 62360167 Mob: +65 94308635 e-mail: [email protected] Point of Interface (POI) and POP location: Connection via a BELGACOM ICS POP The international connection between the BELGACOM ICS network and the Hutch network will be made at a Hutch Point of Presence (POP). The Point of Interface (POT) will be located on the Hutch Digital Distribution Fram....