Joginder Singh, Judicial Member - This bunch of five appeals is by the assessee for assessment years 2007-08 to 2009-10 on the ground that on the facts and in the circumstances of the case, ld. first appellate authority erred in law and in fact in upholding the assessment order under section 195/197 of the Act ignoring the agreement, definition of royalty, and further erred in holding that in the agreement entered into between the assessee and Wood Mackenzie, the assessee got a licence to use/access to scientific work without appreciating the nature of information received by the assessee on payment of access fee.

2. During hearing of these appeals, we have heard Shri Pawan Kumar along with Shri Ravi Sharma, ld. counsels for the assessee and Shri Jasdeep Singh, ld. Senior DR. The assessee has also filed synopsis. The crux of argument is that the subscription fees paid by the assessee to Wood Mackenzie (in short hereinafter, WM) is not in the nature of royalty for information conforming industrial, commercial or scientific experience because WM is not importing any information, knowledge or skill from its experience acquired over a period of time. It was submitted that the industrial experience, that from the other parties from whom information has been obtained, is simply put on website, therefore, it cannot be termed as royalty because it is merely general information concerning commercial aspect of upstream sector of various countries rather than the commercial experience of WM. Therefore, the subscription fees paid for supply of such information, electronically, cannot be treated as royalty. The ld. counsel relied upon the decisions in Factset Research Systems Inc., In re [2009] 182 Taxman 268 (AAR - New Delhi), Wipro Ltd. v. ITO [2005] 94 ITD 9 (Bang.), Dun & Bradstreet Espana S.A., In re [2005] 272 ITR 99/142 Taxman 284 (AAR - New Delhi) and the decision from Hon'ble Madhya Pradesh High Court in CIT v. HEG Ltd. [2003] 130 Taxman 72. Our attention was also invited to the decision in Gartner Ireland Ltd. v. Dy. DIT (International Taxation) [2010] 42 SOT 21 (Mum.) (URO) along with the decision in Infosys Technologies Ltd. v. Dy. CIT [2011] 45 SOT 157 The ld. counsel further contended that the clauses in Research Agreement dated 14.06.2006 does not make any substantial difference to the payment made by OVL because in every such agreement/such contract it contains disclosure clause regarding non-use/non-sharing of information so downloaded. On the other hand, the ld. Senior DR strongly defended the conclusion drawn in the assessment order and impugned order by stating that the nature of the payment has to be seen and even the assessee was also not sure about the nature of such payment. Ld. Senior DR invited our attention to page 34 of paperbook-1 by submitting that it is payment for technical consultancy, therefore, TDS has to be deducted. It was emphatically argued that oil and natural gas is a specialized sector, therefore, it cannot be termed as a general information. More specifically, the assessee engaged WM as an expert adviser and it was a research agreement. The plea was also raised that specialized training along with password are required for such use and access to the system is very specialized. Our attention was invited to page 23 of the paper-book to the effect that even the passwords were provided by WM. Further attention was drawn to page 27 of the paper book containing paras 1.5 and 1.6. The crux of the argument is that it is pure technical information, so TDS was required to be deducted.

3. We have considered the rival submissions and perused the material available on record. In the captioned appeals, since the issues are identical, therefore, these appeals were heard together, consequently can be disposed off by this common and consolidated order for the sake of brevity. The facts, in brief, are that the assessee is engaged in the business of exploration and development of hydro carbon to augment the oil s