SUBBA RAO, C.J.

The matter coming up before Subba Rao, C.J., and Bhimasankaram, J., the Order of Reference to a Full Bench was delivered by.

These are revisions against the orders of the Andhra Sales Tax Appellate Tribunal setting aside the orders of the Deputy Commissioner including the payments collected by the respondent as dharmam in his total turnover. The Tribunal found the following facts on the materials placed before them :

"(1) That charity has been paid as a matter of custom from customers voluntarily,

(2) that it is not shown that it is a part of the price though it is separately shown as an item by itself, and

(3) that it has not gone into the pockets of the sellers as part of the price but is used for purposes of charity as earmarked in the account books of the assessee."

On those findings, the Tribunal held that the items described as dharmam should be excluded from the assessable turnover.

Learned Government Pleader contends that in view of the amended definition of the term "turnover", any sum collected by a dealer in respect of the goods sold at the time of or before the delivery of the goods would be part of his turnover, and, therefore, the sums collected towards dharmam in the present case should be included in the turnover. The amended definition reads :

"'turnover' means the total amount set out in the bill of sale (or if there is no bill of sale, the total amount charged) as the consideration for the sale or purchase of goods...........including any sums charged by the dealer for anything done in respect of the goods sold at the time of or before the delivery of the goods and any other sums charged by the dealer, whatever be the description, name or object thereof."

Learned Government Pleader contends that under this definition, whether the amount collected in respect of the goods sold or the other sums charged by the dealer form part of the consideration for the sale or not they would be part of the turnover if they are included in the bill of sale and in support of that contention reliance is placed upon the decision of a Divisional Bench of this Court in Tax Revision Cases Nos. 51 (Since reported as Poosarla Sambamurthi v. State of Andhra [1956] 7 S.T.C. 652), 52 and 53 of 1955. Though some of the observations therein appear to be wide, in that case it was not decided that the aforesaid sums would be part of the turnover even though they did not form part of the consideration. There may be cases where payments for dharmam may be voluntarily made by a buyer to a dealer though the occasion for that payment is the sale transaction. It can, therefore, be reasonably argued that unless a payment made is part of the consideration for the sale, the mere fact that it is paid on the occasion of the sale does not make it a part of the turnover. As this point arises very frequently, for in most of the cases some sort of additional payments are made towards dhamam or towards other charges, to avoid confusion and to have an authoritative decision, it is necessary to post these cases before a Full Bench. We therefore refer the following question to the Full Bench, viz., "What is the scope of the definition of 'turnover' in section 2(i) of the Madras General Sales Tax Act as amended by the Madras General Sales Tax (Andhra Amendment) Act, 1954".

Opinion

The Opinion of the Full Bench was delivered by

VISWANATHA SASTRI, J. - The question referred to us is as follows :

"What is the scope of the definition of 'turnover' in section 2(i) of the Madras General Sales Tax Act as amended by the Madras General Sales Tax (Andhra Amendment) Act, 1954."

Though the terms of the reference are very wide and general we understand it in the context of the findings of the Sales Tax Appellate Tribunal, to raise the question whether the sales tax collected by a dealer from buyers of goods and payments made by buyers to the dealers on the occasion of sale for dharmam or charity, should be included in the total "turnover" of the dealer.