DWIVEDI, J. - (1.) SECTION 3 of the U.P. Sales Tax Act imposes a tax on the sale of goods. Section 3-A(1) empowers the State Government to notify that the turnover in respect of any goods or class of goods shall be liable to tax at such single point in the series of sales by successive dealers as it may specify in the notification. Section 3-A(2) empowers the Government to fix the rate of tax not exceeding the maximum mentioned therein.
(2.) ACTING under section 3-A, the Government issued a notification on 31st March, 1956. Head 7 of the notification specifies "chemicals of all kinds". According to the notification, sales of chemicals of all kinds, which are manufactured in Uttar Pradesh, shall be liable to tax at the point of sale by the manufacturer, and in case of goods imported from outside U.P., at the point of sale by the importer. The opposite party is a manufacturer of, and a dealer in, sodium silicate and washing soap. In the assessment year 1958-59 the opposite party admittedly sold sodium silicate manufactured by it for Rs. 98,028.00. The Sales Tax Officer treated sodium silicate as a chemical and charged sales tax in accordance with the aforesaid notification. His order was affirmed in appeal. But the Judge (Revisions) reversed his decision. He took the view that sodium silicate was not a chemical. But at the instance of the Commissioner, Sales Tax, the applicant, he referred to this court this question : "Whether sodium silicate as used in the manufacture of soap is included in 'chemicals of all kinds' appearing at item 7 of the notification ....... dated 31st March, 1956 ?" A Division Bench of this court has already given an affirmative answer to this question in the Commissioner of Sales Tax v. Banaras Chemicals ([1967] 20 S.T.C. 246). But the present reference was made before this decision. Counsel for the opposite party has strenuously urged before us that sodium silicate is not a chemical and has requested us to reconsider the decision. But I am quite certain in my mind that Banaras Chemicals ([1967] 20 S.T.C. 246) is rightly decided. At this stage it is proper to touch upon a minor matter. It seems to me that the reference to the manufacture of soap in the question is wholly immaterial. The opposite party is admittedly a manufacturer of, and a dealer in, sodium silicate. It has admittedly sold sodium silicate to buyers in the relevant assessment year. So the material question is whether sodium silicate is a chemical. If it is a chemical within the meaning of that term as used in the notification, it will also be a chemical even when it is used in the manufacture of soap. According to the Judge (Revisions), sodium silicate is not a chemical. He says : "I interpret the word 'chemical' in relation to its common use and purpose. Sodium silicate, which is commonly known as water-glass, is never used in any chemical process or chemical industry. It is used as a filler in cheap soap manufacture. The addition of sodium silicate only increases the weight of the soap without in any way adding to the detergent property of the soap. It is purely a mechanical process." In his arguments before us counsel for the opposite party has given only a lukewarm support to this passage. He has now turned the focus on a new argument. He has tried to reinforce this argument from books on science. The argument proceeds in this way : a chemical, in its true scientific sense, is a substance of definite and known composition. Sodium silicate is a compound of sodium and silicate. Its formula is somewhat indefinite. The formula varies between Na2 Sio2 and Na2 Sio4. Accordingly it is not a chemical.
(3.) I am unable to accept this argument for more than one reason. One, we are required to construe the word "chemical" as used, not in a book of science, but a notification issued under the Sales Tax Act. One of the primary purposes of modern science is simplicity in the formulation of the laws governing nature. This simplicity finds expression in definite and exact formulae. The scientist believes that every detailed occurrence can be correlated with its antecedents in a perfectly definite manner. (But he is for the present baffled by the anarchy the quantum phenomenon). The purpose of a sales tax law, on the other hand, is the collection of revenue, and, with that end, to classify goods according to the usage in trade and commerce. Again, a fiscal enactment is generally marked by complexity. This complexity is the result of compromise of various competing claims and practical considerations such as convenience and despatch in the levy and collection of taxes. It is accordingly not wise to demand scientific simplicity (or definiteness) in a sales tax enactment. Two, scientific definitions are now becoming more abstract and more divorced from common understanding. Hence the word "chemical" should not be interpreted according to the true scientific definition. "The word 'chemical', however, as used in a constitutional exemption from taxation of capital and machinery employed in the manufacture of chemicals, is to be understood not from a scientific point of view, but in its generally accepted meaning .........." (Words and Phrases (Permanent Edition), Vol. 6, page 740). In Commissioner of Sales Tax, Madhya Pradesh v. M/s. Jaswant Singh Charan Singh ([1967] 19 S.T.C. 469), the Supreme Court observed : "But it is now well-settled that while interpreting items in statutes like the Sales Tax Acts, resort should be had not to the scientific or the technical meaning of such terms but to their popular meaning or the meaning attached to them by those dealing in them, that is to say, to their commercial sense." In His Majesty the King v. Planters Nut and Chocolate Company Limited (1951 C.L.R. (Ex.) 122), Cameron, J., said : "The object of the Excise Act is to raise revenue, and for this purpose, to class substances according to the general usage and known denominations of trade. In my view, therefore, it is not the botanist's conception as to what constitutes a 'fruit' or 'vegetable' which must goven the interpretation to be placed on the words, but rather what would ordinarly in matters of commerce in Canada be included therein. Botanically, ornages and lemons are berries, but otherwise no one would consider them as such." In Avadh Sugar Mills Ltd. v. Sales Tax Officer ([1968] 21 S.T.C. 295], I said : "Words are signals invented by a society to facilitate the communication of ideas and things between the signaller at one end and the receiver at the other end. The gradual acquisition of a conventional meaning is necessarily inherent in the social (or group) purpose of their invention. The interpreter should therefore give due emphasis to the social setting of a word. The real meaning often is wrapped up in the sociology of a word.";