MALCOLM ANGUS TULLOCH Vs. REVENUE COMMISSIONER SAMBALPUR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THESE two applications are directed against the order of the Member, Board of Revenue, dated the 10th July, 1952, declining to revise the assessment of the petitioner to sales tax in respect of certain sales effected in 1949 in favour of an American firm named Messrs Union Carbide and Carbon Corporation, New York. The petitioner asked the Member, Board of Revenue, to state a case for the decision of the High Court under section 24(1) of the Orissa Sales Tax Act, but the Member refused and S.J.C. No. 24 of 1952 was filed under sub-section (2) of section 24 of the Orissa Sales Tax act. The petitioner, however, thought it advisable to file an independent application under Article 226 of the Constitution (O.J.C. No. 15 of 1953) against the order of the Member, Board of Revenue, for quashing the assessment order on the aforesaid sale. The two applications were heard together and are disposed of in one judgment.

(2.) THE facts which were admitted by the petitioner himself not only before the Sales Tax Authorities but also in his application before this Court under Article 226 of the Constitution and in his counter-affidavit filed before this Court on the 5th December, 1956, are as follows :-

(3.) THE transactions took place in 1948-49 long before the commencement of the Constitution. The mines are situated in the district of Keonjhar which, prior to the merger on the 1st of January, 1948, was a Native State under a Ruler. The Act came into force in the old Province of Orissa on the 14th May, 1947 and was subsequently applied to the merged States, including Keonjhar, by appropriate notifications. There were some doubts about the validity of the notification applying the said Act to the merged States of Orissa, but these have been set at rest by the recent decision of the Supreme Court in Bharat Sabai Grass Co.'s case ([1958] 9 S.T.C. 289) and in M/s. B. C. Patel and Co.'s case ([1958] 9 S.T.C. 467) (Civil Appeal No. 230 of 1956 decided by the Supreme Court on the 15th April, 1958). In view of the two aforesaid decisions of the Supreme Court the applicability of the said Act to the district of Keonjhar during the relevant period was rightly not challenged before me.