Interpretation of Section 6B(1) by the Karnataka Sales Tax Act, 1957:
This Court also noticed the economic superiority principle for the purpose of levy of turnover tax while holding that the interpretation of statute would not depend upon contingency. It is trite law which the Court would ordinary take recourse to golden rule of strict interpretation while interpreting taxing statutes. In construing penal statutes and taxation statutes, the Court has to apply strict rule of interpretation.
This is what has been considered by this Court in Commissioner of Customs(Import), Mumbai Vs. Dilip Kumar and Company and Others 2018(9) SCC 1 in para 24 and 34 as under:
“24. In construing penal statutes and taxation statutes, the Court has to apply strict rule of interpretation. The penal statute which tends to deprive a person of right to life and liberty has to be given strict interpretation or else many innocents might become victims of discretionary decision making. Insofar as taxation statutes are concerned, Article 265 of the Constitution prohibits the State from extracting tax from the citizens without authority of law. It is axiomatic that taxation statute has to be interpreted strictly because the State cannot at their whims and fancies burden the citizens without authority of law. In other words, when the competent Legislature mandates taxing certain persons/certain objects in certain circumstances, it cannot be expanded/interpreted to include those, which were not intended by the legislature.
34. The passages extracted above, were quoted with approval by this Court in at least two decisions being CIT v. Kasturi and Sons Ltd. (1999) 3 SCC 346 and State of W.B. v. Kesoram Industries Ltd. (2004) 10 SCC 201 (hereinafter referred to as “Kesoram Industries case”, for brevity). In the later decision, a Bench of five Judges, after citing the above passage from Justice G.P. Singh’s treatise, summed up the following principles applicable to the interpretation of a taxing statute:
“(i) In interpreting a taxing statute, equitable considerations are entirely out of place. A taxing statute cannot be interpreted on any presumption or assumption. A taxing statute has to be interpreted in the light of what is clearly expressed; it cannot imply anything which is not expressed; it cannot import provisions in the statute so as to supply any deficiency;
(ii) Before taxing any person, it must be shown that he falls within the ambit of the charging section by clear words used in the section; and
(iii) If the words are ambiguous and open to two interpretations, the benefit of interpretation is given to the subject and there is nothing unjust in a taxpayer escaping if the letter of the law fails to catch him on account of the legislature’s failure to express itself clearly.”
In the instant scheme of the Act of which reference has been made in detail, the expression ‘total turnover’ has been referred to for the purpose of identification/classification of dealers for prescribing various rates/slabs of tax leviable to the dealer and read with first and second proviso to Section 6B(1), this makes the intention of the legislature clear and unambiguous that except the deductions provided under the first proviso to Section 6B(1) nothing else can be deducted from the total turnover as defined under Section 2(u2) for the purpose of levy of turnover tax under Section 6B of the Act.
The submission of learned counsel for the appellant that the ‘total turnover’ in Section 6B(1) is to be read as ‘taxable turnover’ and the determination of the rate of the turnover tax is to be ascertained on the ‘taxable turnover’ on the face of it is unsustainable and deserves outright rejection.
Mystery of Law and Justice 