MARINE INSURANCE POLICIES Vs. BOARD OF REVENUE

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is a reference made by the Board of Revenue, Bengal, under Section 57, Stamp Act, 1899. The reference is for the opinion of the Court as to whether a certain type of document represented by a blank form attached to the statement of the case drawn up by the Board of Revenue should be stamped with duty payable under Art. 47(A)(1)(ii), Schedule 1, Stamp Act, or with duty under Art. 62(c) of the said schedule or with some other and what duty.

(2.) It appears that a certain company or association called the Marine Insurance Association, Calcutta, carry on business in India in the course of which they issue Marine Insurance Policies upon goods. Accordingly, they have upon their policies to pay the stamp duty required by the schedule to the Indian Stamp Act. This Association has observed that, in the course of shipments to India, the policies of insurance or their equivalents sometimes take the form not of policies that have been executed in India but of certificates that have been taken out abroad. It appears that this kind of certificate is so worded in some cases that it may be construed as a document which transfers the rights of the original policy holder under a policy taken out abroad to the person interested in India in the goods shipped in many cases to the bank through whom the bills for the price of the goods are discounted. Accordingly, this Marine Insurance Association appears to have entered into correspondence with the Government of Bengal representing that these certificates, to give them a neutral name, ought to be subjected to duty under the Stamp Act before they are allowed to operate in India. This question has been discussed in the correspondence between this Association and the Government of India, Finance Department, (Central Revenues) as well as the Government of Bengal. Various views have been expressed.

(3.) One view has been expressed by the Stamp Superintendent, Calcutta, to the effect that these documents are chargeable with duty as though they were Marine Insurance Policies. Another view has been expressed by a Department of the Government of India that these documents are of the nature of transfers of interest in a policy and are chargeable with duty under some other heading in the schedule to the Stamp Act. Accordingly without taking steps with reference to any particular document or seeking to make any person liable for duty upon any particular document, the Board of Revenue, Bengal, have attached to their case stated a specimen blank form of certificate and have asked for the opinion of this Court under Section 57 of the Act upon the question whether documents of the character disclosed by this blank form are liable to stamp duty, and if so, under what heading.