HASTINGS MILL LTD Vs. STATE OF WEST BENGAL

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE facts of the case will appear from the petition for revision and the order of the Additional Commissioner, Commercial Taxes, dated 25th August, 1954.

(2.) THE learned Advocate for the petitioners took up only two points before me, (1) that the petitioners have succeeded by producing sufficient evidence to show that the goods, in respect of which claim had been made under section 5(2)(a)(v) of the Bengal Finance (Sales Tax) Act, 1941, had been despatched by the petitioners themselves to addressees outside West Bengal and (2) that the addition of Rs. 17,94,030 made by the assessing authority to the petitioners' taxable turnover on account of the transfer of delivery orders to the Adviser on Jute Supplies, Government of India, was illegal, as these were not sales but only transfer of actionable claims which are excluded from the definition of "goods" in the Act.

(3.) AS for the second argument of the learned Advocate for the petitioners, a complete answer is provided by the definition of "document of title of goods" in section 2(4) of the Sale of Goods Act, where it is specifically laid down that order for the delivery of goods amounts to documents of title demands. This point was further clarified by the Calcutta High Court in Anglo-India Jute Mills Co. v. Omademull ((1911) 38 Cal. 127). There it was decided that a delivery order is recognised as a document of title under section 108 of the Contract Act and section 137 of the Transfer of Property Act, and under a delivery order the transferee acquires a title to the goods to which it relates.