Judgment

HEGDE, J.: In this appeal by special leave the true ambit of item 1 in the Schedule to the Medicinal and Toilet Preparations (Excise Duties) Act, 1955 (to be hereinafter referred to as the Act) read with S. 3 (1) of that Act comes up for consideration.

2. The appellant is a manufacturer of certain medicines with the aid of substances like tincture, spirit etc. The tincture and spirit in their turn contain alcohol. The Superintendent of Excise called upon the appellant to pay duty under the Act on the medicinal preparations on the ground that they contain alcohol. The appellant resisted the demand on the ground that the medicines in question were not prepared by adding pure alcohol; the fact that the tincture which is a component of that preparation contains alcohol does not make it a preparation containing alcohol. That contention was rejected by the Superintendent of Excise as well as by the High Court in the Writ petition brought by the appellant.

3. It is admitted that alcohol though it was not directly added, is a component of the medicinal preparations in question. That alcohol has not undergone any chemical change into some other substance. It is present in a liquid for