TEXTOOL COMPANY LIMITED Vs. STATE OF MADRAS

JUDGEMENT

(1.) IN these two writ petitions, the petitions are Messrs Textool Company Ltd., Coimbatore. They carry on business in the manufacture of textile machinery along with other items. They filed A.2 returns under the Madras General Sales Tax Act furnishing a turnover of rupees eleven lakhs and odd for September, 1964, and nearly rupees seven lakhs for October, 1964, and claimed that the sales should be assessed at the ordinary rate of 2 per cent. The second respondent, the Joint Commercial Tax Officer, Coimbatore, was of the opinion that the textile machinery fell under entry 41 of the First Schedule to the Madras General Sales Tax Act, 1959, as amended by Madras Act XV of 1964 and that the concerned turnover should be assessed at the single point rate of 6 per cent. The petitioners' contention in both these writ petitions is that entry 41 refers only to electrical machinery, but the textile machinery which the petitioners sold is not electrical machinery and therefore could not be assessed at the higher single point rate mentioned in entry 41. The view of the department, as set out in their counter-affidavit was that while entry 41, as it stood before the amendment made by Madras Act XV of 1964, did not make any reference to machinery, the entry was deliberately amended by the aforesaid Act by the inclusion of machinery, so that all machinery, whether electrical or not, could be brought within the entry.

(2.) THIS view was sought to be supported by a reference to the statement of objects and reasons, which led up to the passing of Act XV of 1964, wherein it is stated :

(3.) BEFORE amendment it read :