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TMI Blog1972 (12) TMI 68X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... ion and filed an appeal to the Appellate Assistant Commissioner, Tanjore, without success. The assessee again filed an appeal to the Tribunal. While the appeal was pending, he raised additional grounds contending that the entire sales turnover of coconut are exemptable as coconut is a fruit and exempted as per Government Notification No. 1764, Revenue, dated 5th April, 1960. The original contention regarding coconut was that it is an oil-seed and, therefore, liable for single point levy and that the transactions by him being second sales were not liable to tax. The Sales Tax Appellate Tribunal (Second Additional Bench), Madras, deleted the addition of Rs. 30,457.59 on the ground that there is no proof of any sales suppression. Regarding the addition of Rs. 28,064.86 towards actual suppression, the Tribunal found that the assessee was able to prove that a turnover of Rs. 3,399.50 has been brought into accounts and, therefore, reduced the addition towards suppression to Rs. 24,665.36. On the question whether coconut is a fresh fruit within the meaning of the Government notification dated 5th April, 1960, the Tribunal held that coconut is a fresh fruit and is exemptable. On the other ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... nd that the Tribunal's Madurai Bench has already expressed the view following the decision of the Madras Bench in T.A. Nos. 2395 and 2396 of 1966 that coconut is neither a fresh fruit nor vegetable. The same writ petitioner has filed W.P. No. 3425 of 1970 in respect of the assessment year 1969-70. In this case, he did not even go in appeal to the Appellate Assistant Commissioner in view of the decision of the Appellate Tribunal and has filed the writ petition directly against the assessment order. In both the writ petitions, the same contentions are raised that coconut is a fresh fruit or a vegetable and, therefore, exempt from sales tax. We are concerned in this case not with tender coconut or green coconut or immature coconut but with ripened coconut. The expression "ripened coconut" includes dehusked coconut as also coconut with husk. We are using the expression "coconut" in our judgment in this case to, mean both dehusked coconut and coconut with husk. In view of the decision of a Division Bench of this Court in Kannappa Mudaliar v. State of Madras[1968] 21 S.T.C. 41., which is binding on us, the learned counsel for the petitioner in T.C. No. 411 of 1969 did not advance any a ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... r[1961] 12 S.T.C. 286 (S.C.). and Commissioner of Sales Tax v. Jaswant Singh Charan Singh[1967] 19 S.T.C. 469 (S.C.). In Ramavatar Budhaiprasad v. Assistant Sales Tax Officer(1), it was held that the word "vegetable" found in the schedule to the C.P. and Berar Sales Tax Act, 1947, must be construed not in any technical sense nor from the botanical point of view but as understood in common parlance. Being a word of every day use, it must be construed in its popular sense meaning that sense which the people conversant with the subject-matter with which the statute is dealing, would attribute to it. It has to be construed as understood in common language. In Commissioner of Sales Tax v. Jaswant Singh Charan Singh(2), the Supreme Court observed "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". The Supreme Court approved the principle laid down in His Majesty the King v. Planters Nut and Chocolate Company Ltd.[1951] C.L.R. (Ex.) 122., where the question was whether ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... icles of food, nuts, coconuts, dehydrated vegetables)", we find in the notification dated 5th April, 1960, the following words "vegetables other than dried and dehydrated vegetables, fresh fruits". The employment of the words "fresh fruits" in the place of "fruits" appearing in the original notification under the old Act is, in our opinion, significant. It seems to us that the Government has employed a compendious term "fresh fruits" instead of the descriptive words "fruits, other than canned, dried, preserved or dehydrated fruits". It should be borne in mind that coconut had always been taxed under the Sales Tax Act though "fruits" were exempted. There is very little material for holding that the Government had changed their view and exempted coconut also from taxation under the new Act. In this connection, we may also use the test laid down in His Majesty the King v. Planters Nut and Chocolate Company Ltd.[1951] C.L.R. (Ex.) 122., which decision was cited with approval by the Supreme Court in Commissioner of Sales Tax v. Jaswant Singh Charan Singh[1967] 19 S.T.C. 469 (S.C.). It was stated therein "counsel for the plaintiff suggested a test which I think apposite. Would a househ ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X
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