SUBHAS CHANDRA GHOSH Vs. THE STATE OF TRIPURA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) BY means of this petition, the petitioner has submitted that the seizure of the cement which has been transported by him in Tripura is illegal since on the date of seizure i.e. 30th August, 2014 he held a valid license to bring cement into the State of Tripura without payment of tax.

(2.) THE undisputed facts are that the petitioner is a businessman dealing in the sale of various items. He was initially registered as a dealer under the Tripura Sales Tax Act, 1976 on 09.11.1976. He was permitted to deal in the resale of a large number of goods but cement or its substitute were not one of the goods which he was to deal with. The petitioner was again registered under the Sales Tax Act on 12.01.1977 and here also he was allowed to deal in many goods but cement was not one of the goods. The petitioner submitted an information sheet on 06.01.2005 in terms of the Tripura Value Added Tax and the following items are mentioned in the said information sheet:

(3.) WE have perused the certificate of registration from the original file which was issued on 12th December, 2005 and in that certificate the word cement is not there. We also find that thereafter renewals were done and cement was never mentioned. A photocopy of this information sheet is also on the file at page No. 8 of the File bearing No. File -3 (CERTIFICATE) VAT and CST File w.e.f. 01.04.2014. Surprisingly, this photocopy does not tally with the original. The words 'cement and hardware goods' are not even there in this column of the photocopy. There are some other changes also on the first page but we are not concerned with the same. This however, clearly indicates that somebody permitted the petitioner or his officials to make correction in the original information sheet at a later stage but those corrections could not be made in the photostat copy which also bears a photocopy of the stamp dated 06.01.2005. It is more apparent that these entries were made at a later stage.