Case Law Details
Sonka Publication (India) Pvt. Ltd. Vs Union of India & Ors. (Delhi High Court)
In this case, a question to be asked is whether the books in question merely help the child in improving the child‘s handwriting by providing space in a book by copying from a written text or does it pose questions to the child to answer and whether the teacher then can evaluate, on the basis of such answers, the child‘s ability and understanding? In the present case, the ‘work books‘ or ‘practice books‘ printed and sold by the Petitioner certainly fall in the latter category i.e. they test the child“s knowledge, ask questions which the child has to answer, and facilitate evaluating the child‘s understanding.
These books are not ‘exercise books‘ as understood by the trade. It must be mentioned at this stage that the learned counsel for the Petitioner has produced before the Court samples of such ‘exercise books/ exercise note books‘ as understood in trade parlance. These are simply bound volumes of blank pages which may contain lines to facilitate writing. They do nothing more than providing space for writing.
Consequently, this Court is satisfied that in the present case, the books published and sold by the Petitioner are classifiable under HSN 49.01 and not HSN 48.02. In terms of Notification No.2/2017-Central Tax (Rrate) dated 28thJune, 2017 i.e. Entry No.119 thereunder, such goods classifiable under HSN 49.01 i.e. “printed books, including Braille books“ are wholly exempted from tax.
FULL TEXT OF THE HIGH COURT ORDER / JUDGMENT
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