M/S Bansal Wire Industries Ltd.& Anr vs State Of U.P.& Ors

3. In all these appeals identical issues are involved. We therefore, proceed to dispose of all these appeals by this 2 common Judgment and Order. In order to arrive at a finding on the issue raised, it will be necessary to set out certain facts leading to filing of the present appeals.

An assessment order was passed under Rule 41(8) of the UP Trade Tax Rules for the assessment year 1999-2000 under the UP Trade Tax Act, 1948 (for short "the UP Act") as well as under the Central Act. As per the said assessment order, the tax on sales of "stainless steel wire" was levied @ 4% and sales covered by Form 3-kh were taxed @ 2%.

5. The respondent, however, thereafter held that the sales of "stainless steel wire" has wrongly been taxed @ 4% treating the same as a "declared commodity" and that in fact "stainless steel wire" is not a declared commodity because it is outside the ambit of "Iron and Steel", which is a declared commodity under Section 14 of the Central Act.

7. The Additional Commissioner, Grade-I, Trade Tax, Ghaziabad Zone, Ghaziabad issued a notice dated 22.03.2006 directing the appellant to show cause as to why the permission should not be granted to the assessing authority for re-opening of the case under Section 21(2) of the UP Act.

11. Being aggrieved by the issuance of the aforesaid notice, the appellant herein filed a Writ Petition before the Allahabad High Court, which was registered as Writ Petition No. 770 of 2006, wherein, the respondent filed a counter affidavit. The Allahabad High Court, thereafter heard the counsel appearing for the parties and by its judgment and order dated 21.05.2010 dismissed the Writ Petition holding that the "stainless steel wire" is not covered under the item "tools, alloys and special steel" on entry no. (ix) and, therefore, does not fall under "Iron and Steel" as defined under clause (iv) of Section 14 of the Central Act and therefore the provision of Section 15 of the Central Act does not apply.

is a specie thereof and therefore such "stainless steel wire"

33. It is thus clear, that the language used in entry no. (ix) is plain and unambiguous and that the items which are mentioned there are "tools, alloy and special steel". By using the words "of any of the above categories" in entry Nos. (ix) would refer to entries (i) to (viii) and it cannot and does not refer to entry no (xv). However, entry (xvi) of Clause (iv) would be included in entry (xvi) particularly within the expression now therein any of the aforesaid categories. Therefore, the specific entry "tool, alloy and special steel" being not applicable to entry

(xv), the contention of the counsel for the appellant has to be rejected. It is, therefore, held that the stainless steel wire is not 18 covered within entry (ix) of clause (iv) of Section 14 of Central Sales Tax Act.

38. In our considered opinion, the findings arrived at by the High Court does not suffer from any infirmity. Consequently, we find no merit in these appeals and the same are dismissed without any order as to costs.

............................................J [Dr. Mukundakam Sharma ] ............................................J 20 [ Anil R. Dave ] New Delhi, April 26, 2011.