PROVINCE OF MADRAS Vs. FIRM OF KANIGOLLA SIVALAKSHMINARAYANA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The judgment which my learned brother is about to deliver, which I have, with advantage and pleasure read before-hand, deals with adequate particularity of detail the questions in issue and therefore I propose to add only a few words as regards the legal question arising in the case.

(2.) Though fiscal statutes resembling the Madras General Sales Tax Act of 1939, had been in vogue in at least three of the Nations constituting the British Commonwealth before the enactment of the Act in question by the Madras Legislature, and General Sales Tax Acts were in force in about 25 States of the U. S. A. as well as in various European countries, our attention has not been drawn to any provision of an enactment similar to Section 8 of the Statute which we have to interpret. Such being the case, the decision on the point should rest solely on the interpretation of the words of the section unhampered and uninfluenced by any notions of things prevalent in other countries.

(3.) A strict grammatical and etymological interpretation of the word " dealer " as denned in Section 2(b) of Act IX of 1939 would include persons like the plaintiffs in the present action even if they had merely acted as commission agents, because either as agents for buying goods on behalf of a known principal or as a selling agent on behalf of a known principal, they should be deemed to be persons who carry on the business of buying or selling goods. If such a person is a " dealer " then Section 3 of the Act says that subject to the provisions of the Act every dealer shall pay, in each year, a tax in accordance with the scale specified. There are also various provisos to the section with which we are not actually concerned at this stage. It is only by a later section, viz., Section 8, that an agent is excluded. Had it not been for the incorporation of Section 8, even a person who, for an agreed commission or brokerage, buys or sells goods on behalf of known principals, specified In his accounts in respect of each transaction, will be a " dealer " within the meaning of the Act and hence liable to be taxed. Therefore the question is how far the exemption contained in the last mentioned section absolves the present plaintiffs from liability to pay the tax in regard to the dealings mentioned in the suit. The real nature of a commission agency in relation to the dominion over goods is defined by Blackburn, J., in Ireland v. Livingston (1871) L.R. 5 H.L. 395. The discussion arose there, as a result of the question put to the Judges by Lord Chelmsford, L.G., for which the Judges responded with the answer. At page 408, Blackburn, J., observes as follows: