SRINIVASAN, J.

The assessee is a dealer in hides and skins and the assessment is in respect of the assessment year 1957-58 under the Central Sales Tax Act. The department brought to tax a turnover of Rs. 4, 36, 526 at one per cent. under section 8(1) of the Act and a turnover of Rs. 1, 15, 928 at two per cent. under section 8(2) of the Act. The petitioners objected to the levy under the Central Sales Tax Act contending that the relevant provisions of that Act had not been brought into force by a proper and valid notification and that the levy of tax at two per cent. under section 8(2) of the Act is illegal being discriminatory. These contentions failed before the Sales Tax Appellate Tribunal and the same contentions are now pressed before us.

Originally the petitioners appear to have claimed that they were only agents in putting through the sale transactions, and that, therefore, no inter-State sales were involved. This contention was examined and found to be not established and that contention has now been abandoned.

We have in T.C. Nos. 171 to 173 of 1960 (Since reported as K. Mohamed Elias and Co. and Others v. The State of Madras separately dealt with the question of the validity of the notification bringing section 6 of the Act into force and similar contentions advanced in these cases have been repelled by us. Following that decision, we hold that the attack upon the validity of the notification must fail.

Under section 8(1) of the Act, as it stood during the year of assessment, inter-State sales to a registered dealer of the goods of the description referred to in sub-section (3) were made liable to tax at one per cent. of the turnover. The proviso to this section stated that if under the sales tax law of the appropriate State, sales or purchases of goods of that description were either exempt or were subject to tax at rates lower than one per cent., the Central Sales Tax Act should also follow those rates, that is, it should be "nil" in the one case or should be at the lower rate in the other. The goods are hides and skins which are undoubtedly goods of the description referred to in sub-section (3). Learned counsel claims that these goods are "exempt" from tax under the local sales tax law and that, therefore, the rate of Central sales tax on inter-State sales should be at the "nil" rate. It is true that the sale of hides and skins is subject to tax at a single point under the local sales tax law. It is not the same thing as saying that the sale or purchase of such goods is exempt from tax under that law. The expression used in the proviso to section 8(1) is

"......... if under the sales tax law of the appropriate State, the sale or purchase of any goods by a dealer is exempt from tax generally and not in specified cases or in specified circumstances ........." *

To our minds, the correct interpretation of this expression is that the goods should be totally exempt from tax before similar exemption from the levy of Central sales tax can become available; but where the exemption from taxation is conferred on conditions such as that the turnover of a dealer under the local sales tax law is below the minimum prescribed, or that the tax will attach to a transaction only in certain circumstances, there is no exemption from tax "generally". This provision cannot apply to the present case.It is next argued, with particular reference to the part of the turnover made taxable under section 8(2) of the Act, that since the incidence of tax in a case falling under section 8(2) shall be calculated at the same rate and "in the same manner as would have been done if the sale had in fact taken place inside the appropriate State", there can be no incidence of tax for the reason that the petitioners in respect of the present transactions must be regarded, as a second dealer, the transactions in hides and skins being taxable under the local sales tax law only at a single point. Here again, learned counsel in putting forward this a