STATE OF MADRAS Vs. COCHIN COAL CO

JUDGEMENT

(1.) These appeals arise out of three suits brought by the same plaintiff (a company called the Cochin Coal Company Ltd.) against the State of Madras for the refund of sales tax collected for the years ending 31st March. 1946, 31st March, 1947, and 31st March, 1948, under the provisions of the Madras General Sales Tax Act. The suits, O. S. Nos. 41, 42 and 53 of 1950 on the file of the Subordinate Judges Court, Kozhikode, were decreed by that court (excepting to a very small extent which may be ignored), the contention of the plaintiff that the sales on which the tax was assessed and collected took place, not within the Province of Madras but within the Indian State of Cochin, being upheld. (All references to territorial units will be in accordance with the state of affairs prevailing at the time). The State has appealed. A.S. No. 651 of 1954 (withdrawn to the High Court from the District Court, South Malabar, where it was A. S. No. 4 of 1953) is its appeal from O. S. No. 41; A. S. N. 348 of 1953 its appeal from O. S. No. 42; and A. S. No, 349 of 1953, from O. S. No. 53.

(2.) The only question in the appeals is whether the sales in question took place in the Indian State of Cochin as contended by the plaintiff or in the District of Malabar in the Province of Madras as contended by the defendant.

(3.) The plaintiff company, as its name indicates, trades in coal and has its office in Fort Cochin in the Malabar District of the Madras Province It has its coal dump in an island called the Candle Island, also in the Malabar District. The sales in question are of three kinds: F.O.R. or free on rail (Cochin Harbour Terminus); F. O. W. or free on walloms (wallom is Malayalam for boat); and T. I. B. or trimmed into bunkers. O.S. No 42 of 1950 and O. S. No. 53 of 1950 concern themselves only with T. I. B. sales but in O. S. No. 41 of 1950 all three kinds of sales are involved, F. O. R. sales amounting to Rs. 1,82,771-5-9, F. O. W. sales to Rs. 45,139-13-4 and T. I. B. sales to Rs. 1,37,137-8-6.