- (1.) The petitioner has preferred instant writ petition under Article 226 of the Constitution of India feeling aggrieved with the impugned order passed under Section 25 of the Uttar Pradesh Value Added Tax Act, 2008 (in short VAT Act) after remand of the matter by the Trade Tax Tribunal, Lucknow. The impugned assessment order imposing tax has been assailed pointing out the jurisdictional error claiming transaction to be Inter-State sales.
(2.) In this bunch of writ petitions, common question of law and facts are involved and the same assessment order has been challenged, hence with the consent of the parties' counsel, arguments were heard and now decided by common judgment. Writ petition No. 6281 of 2010 is treated as leading writ petition to adjudicate the controversy.
(3.) Keeping in view lengthy argument advanced by the parties' counsel, we are adjudicating the dispute under the following heads: (I) Facts (II) Maintainability of Writ Petition (III) Constitutional and Statutory Provisions (IV) Law Commission Report on Article 286 (V) Central Sales Tax Act 1956 (VI) Literal Construction/Deemed Provision In Section 3 of the CST Act (VII) Central Sales Tax (Registration and Turnover) Rules,1957 (VIII) U.P. Value Added Tax Act, 2008 (IX) Other Statutory Provisions (X) Section 3 and 4 of the CST Act (XI) Production Sharing Contract (PSA) (XII) Gas Sales and Purchase Agreement (GSPA) (XIII) Gas Transmission Agreement (GTA) (XIV) Common Carrier- Open Access System (XV) Construction of Agreement (XVI) Whether GSPA/GTA are colourable device to escape tax liability? (XVII) Whether Movement is Necessary to Constitute Inter-State Sale (XVIII) Situs of the Sale (XIX) Sales of Goods Act (XX) Assessing Authority (XXI) Main Judgments relied upon by the State of U.P. (XXII) American Law (XXIII) Finding We have heard Shri Abhishek Manu Singhvi, Shri R.N.Trivedi, Shri Bharat Ji Agrawal, Shri Vivek Tankha, Shri Prashant Chandra, Shri S.M.K. Chaudhari, Shri Sunil Gupta, learned Senior Counsels assisted by their associate counsels, assailing the impugned order passed by assessing authority assisted by other counsels and Shri J. N. Mathur, learned Senior Counsel assisted by Shri H.P.Srivastava for the State of U.P. A large number of cases have been cited by the both sides, relevant of which is considered while dealing with different issues under the aforesaid heads. (I) FACTS;