THE ADDITIONAL COMMISSIONER (LEGAL), COMMERCIAL TAXES, RAJASTHAN & ANR. versus M/S. LOHIYA AGENCIES & ANR. on 8 January 2019

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[2019] 1 S.C.R.

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THE ADDITIONAL COMMISSIONER (LEGAL),COMMERCIAL TAXES, RAJASTHAN & ANR.

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M/S. LOHIYA AGENCIES & ANR.

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(Civil Appeal Nos. 180-186 of 2019)

JANUARY 08, 2019

[RANJAN GOGOI, SANJAY KISHAN KAUL ANDK. M. JOSEPH, JJ.]

Rajasthan Value Added Tax, 2003:C

Schedule IV Entry 56 – ‘Gypsum Board’ – Whether would fallwithin Entry 56 of Schedule IV and be taxed at 4% for the relevantassessment years i.e. 2006-07 and 2007-08 or would fall under theresiduary Entry 1 of Schedule V – Held: Original Entry 56 wasexpanded by legislature from ‘Gypsum’ to ‘Gypsum in all its forms’D– Addition of expression ‘in all its forms’ to the expression ‘Gypsum’ ,should be construed to include different forms of gypsum and notjust gypsum in its original form – Therefore, amended Entry 56 ofSchedule IV would include ‘Gypsum Board’ under the term ‘all itsforms’ – Interpretation of Statutes – Notification No.F.12(63)FD/ETax/2005-19, dated 19.4.2006 – Notification No. S.O.36.No.F.12(59)FD/Tax/2014-14 dated 14.7.2014.

Dismissing the appeals, the Court

HELD: 1. The amended Entry 56 of Schedule IV ofRajasthan Value Added Tax Act, 2003 (RVAT), read as ‘gypsumFin all its forms’, would include ‘gypsum board’ under the term‘all its forms’. A meaning has to be given to the Entry made bythe legislature, expanding the original Entry from ‘gypsum’ to‘gypsum in all its forms’. If the object was to include only‘gypsum’, then why would the Entry be changed to‘gypsum in allGits forms’? The corollary would also be as to what is meant by ‘inall its forms’, as it is not, as if mere geometrical alteration of ashape would form part of the Entry. In such a situation, the originalEntry itself was comprehensive enough to have included it. [Paras13 and 14][142-B-D]

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2. In the present case, there is really no chemical changewhich occurs in the substance as dehydration only reduces thewater content and thereafter, it is mixed with additives for thepurpose of increasing bonding and other related purposes.Substantively, the character of ‘gypsum’ is not changed in themechanical exercise of converting it into a board along with, ofcourse, certain chemical processes of heating and mixing, toachieve an ultimate objective. [Para 14][142-E-F]

3. ‘Words must be construed with some imagination of thepurposes which lie behind them’. Therefore, the expression ‘in allforms’ being added to ‘gypsum’ should be construed to naturallyinclude not only just gypsum in its original form but in differentforms as well. [Para 16][142-H; 143-A]

4. The manufacturing process of gypsum board would showthat the initial steps are of only crushing and grinding the gypsumwhereafter it is heated and partially dehydrated, which in turn iscalled ‘stucco’ or ‘Plaster of Paris’. There does not appear to beany doubt that such ‘stucco’ would form part of the Entry ‘in allits forms’. The unique characteristic of stucco, when mixed withwater, is that the smooth plastic mass so formed can be moldedinto the desired shape, which obtains its rock-like state onhardening. This very characteristic is stated to be used in thedevelopment and production of gypsum board. In the secondstep of the manufacturing process, stucco is mixed with a numberof additives in an excess amount of water to prepare a slurry, tobe ultimately converted back into a dehydrated form, before beingcut into desired sizes. Not only that, ‘gypsum board’ is definedas real gypsum between two paper sheets. That take away fromthe description of gypsum. Even if the sheets are added, thewide description ‘in all its forms’ would certainly include ‘gypsumboard’. [Para 17][143-B-D]

5. In fact, gypsum board, devoid of its top and bottomboards, can be utilized, with some processing, in a similar manneras gypsum. When the meaning of the word ‘form’ is meant toinclude ‘visible shape or configuration of something’, there is noreason why gypsum board would not form a part of the expandedterminology ’in all its forms’. [Para 18]

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A6. In terms of notification No.S.O.36.No.F.12(59)FD/Tax/2014-14 dated 14[th] July, 2014, the RVAT was amended to include,in Schedule V, a separate Entry under item No.19(viii) ‘gypsumboard and other false ceiling material’. Thus, the legislature by aconscious decision in 2014, sought to create a separate Entry forgypsum board, which was not the case in respect of theBassessment years in question. This belies the endeavor to includegypsum board in the residuary Entry, before such specificinclusion as then, there would have been no need for such anEntry. The obvious attempt is to exclude it from ‘gypsum in allits forms’ in Schedule IV of the Act (RVAT) and create a separateCEntry in Schedule V, whereafter it would naturally be governedby the tax rate applicable to the Entry in question.[Para 21][144-D-F]

Commissioner of Sales Tax, Mumbai v. India GypsumLtd. (2009) 25 VST 210 (Bom.); The States of GujaratDv. Sakarwala Brothers (1967) 19 STC 24 (SC);TrutufSafety Glass Industries v. Commissioner of Sales Tax,U.P. (2007) 7 SCC 242 : [2007] 8 SCR 860;Tungabhadra Industries Ltd v. Commercial Tax Officer,Kurnool [1961] 2 SCR 14; State of Jharkhand and Orsv. LA Opala R.G. Ltd. (2014) 15 SCC 136; RajasthanERoller Flour Mills Assn v. State of Rajasthan (1994)Supp. 1 SCC 413 : [1993] 2 Suppl. SCR 72; AlladiVenkateswarlu & Ors. v. Govt. of Andhra Pradesh &Ors. (1978) 2 SCC 552 : [1978] 2 SCR 190 – reliedon.

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Case Law Reference

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CIVIL APPELLATE JURISDICTION: Civil Appeal Nos.180-186 of 2019.

From the Judgment and Order dated 03.02.2017 of the HighCourt of Judicature for Rajasthan at Jaipur Bench, Jaipur in S.B. SalesTax Revision/Reference Nos.9-15 of 2013.

Harsha Vinoy, Milind Kumar, Advs. for the appellants.

M. P. Devanath, Abhishek Anand, Vivek Sharma, Udit Jain, Advs.for the respondents.

The Judgment of the Court was delivered by SANJAY KISHAN KAUL, J. 1. Leave granted.

2. ‘Gypsum’ (calcium sulphate dihydrate – CaSO4.2H2O) is anatural mineral which is used in avariety of activities and productslikepesticides, as a soil additive, as a water additive, as a food additive,forplant treatment, but, more importantly, in the present context, forconstruction purposes. Under the Rajasthan Value Added Tax Act, 2003(hereinafter referred to as ‘RVAT’), Entry 56 of Schedule IV specified‘Gypsum’ as a taxable entity, at 4%. This Entry was, however, amendedand substituted vide Notification No. F.12(63)FD/Tax/2005-19, dated19.4.2006, notified, inter alia, to expand the meaning of Entry 56 ofSchedule IV of the RVAT by changing itto ‘Gypsum in all its forms’.The short question which arises for consideration in the present appealis whether ‘gypsum board’ would fallwithin this Entry 56, and be taxedat 4%, for the relevant assessment years, or whether it wouldfall in thethen residuary Entry 1 of Schedule V, to be taxed at 12.5%.

3. The brief facts which have given rise to the present dispute areas follows. M/s. Indian Gypsum Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as ‘IGL’),a manufacturer of what is commonly known as drywall or ‘gypsumboard’, moved an application under Section 36 of RVAT before theAdditional Commissioner, Commercial Tax Department, Rajasthan, Jaipurfor ascertaining whether gypsum board would fall within the category ofthe amended Entry 56 of Schedule IV of the RVAT, with 4% rate of taxapplicable, or under the residuary Entry referred to aforesaid. TheAdditional Commissioner, vide order dated 27.9.2007, opined that ‘gypsumboard’, being commercially a different product would not fall under Entry56 of Schedule IV of the RVAT but would fall under the residuary Entry,making it subject to the 12.5% slab of taxation. The gravamen of A

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Areasoning of the Additional Commissioner, as found from the order, isthat ‘gypsum board’ is a separate commercial product using a differentname and thus the factum of 95% of the ‘gypsum board’ being constitutedof gypsum is not relevant, as supported by the fact that a longmanufacturing process is involved in preparing ‘gypsum board’, whereinin addition to the calcination process, additives, paper, foam, water etc.,Bare used, resulting in the formation of a product having uses, quitedissimilar to gypsum.

4. M/s. Lohiya Agencies/respondent No.1, is stated to be amerchant dealing in ‘gypsum board’ procured from IGL and, thus, cameto be assessed by the Commercial Tax Officer for the assessment yearC2006-07 and 2007-08 on 25.8.2007, post-inspection of his premises. Sincethe sale of gypsum board has been made with the VAT rate at 4%despite the said goods not falling under Entry 56 of Schedule IV of theRVAT, it was alleged by the Tax Department that there was tax evasionwhich led to initiation of proceedings under Sections 25, 55 & 61 ofDRVAT and the respondent firm was made liable to pay the differentialtax of 8.5% for the assessment years, along with penalty and interest.The endeavours of the respondent No.1, assessee, before the DeputyCommissioner (Appeals) failed in terms of order dated 2.1.2009 andalso before the Rajasthan Tax Board vide order dated 21.11.2012. Thisculminated in a revision petition being filed before the Rajasthan HighECourt which, however, reversed the views expressed by the forumsbelow, in terms of the impugned order dated 3.2.2017. In arriving atsuch a conclusion, the High Court relied upon judgments of the BombayHigh Court in Commissioner of Sales Tax, Mumbai v. India GypsumLtd.[1] and the Supreme Court in The States of Gujarat v. SakarwalaFBrothers[2] as well as in Trutuf Safety Glass Industries v. Commissionerof Sales Tax, U.P.[3]

5. We have had the benefit of arguments and reference to judicialpronouncements, by both the parties before us with Mr. Harsha Vinoy,learned counsel canvassing the case of the appellant, while on behalf ofGthe respondent No.1, the submissions were made by Mr. M.P. Devanath,learned counsel.

6. In our considered view, to truly appreciate the controversy athand, two aspects have to be kept in mind. Firstly, the change of the 1 (2009) 25 VST 210 (Bom.). 2 (1967) 19 STC 24 (SC).H 3 (2007) 7 SCC 242.

Entry by a conscious decision of the legislature, whereby the Entry ofmere ‘gypsum’ was changed to ‘gypsum in all its forms’. This certainlysignified that something more than basic gypsum was sought to be includedin the Entry by referring to ‘gypsum in all its forms’. The sequitur wouldbe whether ‘gypsum board’ would fall in the expanded definition of‘gypsum in all its forms’ or whether it is completely a different product.

7. Secondly (it is really in order to appreciate the first), what is theoriginal composition of gypsum, and how does the processing convert itinto gypsum board, would have to be examined.

8. Gypsum wallboard is a cellulosic composite material, also knownas drywall, used as an interior wall in many building applications and alsoin limited external applications. This composite material consists of aflat board comprising of a gypsum core with the external surfaces coveredwith paperboard. The result is a three-layer composite composed ofpaper/gypsum/paper. The primary raw material continues to be gypsummineral [Calcium Sulphate Dihydrate (CaSO4.2H2O)] and cellulose.

9. A perusal of the material available in public domain onmanufacture of gypsum board shows a common thread insofar asmethodology is concerned. It will be useful to extract the process fromone such material as under:-

“Gypsum board is manufactured in a two step process. In thefirst step, finely crushed and ground gypsum [calcium sulphatedihydrate (CaSO4.2H2O)] is heated and partially dehydrated(Calcined) to Calcium Sulphate Hemihydrate (CaSO4.½H2O),called stucco in the industry, also popularly known as ‘Plaster ofParis’. A unique characteristic of stucco is that when it is mixedwith the proper amount of water, it forms a smooth plastic masswhich can be molded into any desired shape. When the hardeninghas been completed, the mass has been chemically restored to itsrock-like state. This characteristic has also been used in thedevelopment and production of gypsum board. In the secondstep of manufacturing process stucco is mixed with number ofadditives, foam and an excess amount of water to prepare gypsumslurry which is extruded on a fast moving, continuous boardproduction line between two layers of special gypsum papers.‘Raw’ gypsum board is then allowed to fully hydrate – calciumsulphate hemi hydrate is converted back to dihydrate – before it AB

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Ais cut to desired size and before it enters a ‘gypsum kiln’, whereat elevated temperature the excess water is driven off.”[4]

10. In commercial terms, ‘gypsum board’ is defined as gypsumbetween two paper sheets. Gypsum derived from recycled gypsumboard can be used in many ways in which gypsum is originally used too,Bsuch as –

(a) The manufacture of new drywall

(b) Use as an ingredient in the production of cement

(c) Application to soils and crops to improve soil drainage andCplant growth (d) A major ingredient in the production of fertilizer products (e) An additive to composting operations[5]

11. If we look into other forms of gypsum, where gypsum is innatelypresent in the end product, two examples stare at us: (i) Plaster of ParisDand (ii) gypsum blocks. Plaster of Paris (stucco) is merely calcinatedcalcium sulphate, a dehydrated form of gypsum. Gypsum Blocks, onthe other hand, are composed of gypsum plaster, water and in somecases additives like vegetable or wood fibre, for greater strength. Thegypsum boards are used as thinner plasterboards for paneling stud walls.EThe aforesaid material itself gives rise to the conclusion that there areno major chemical changes in gypsum which are carried out other thandehydration and mixing of additives, so that the paper sheets can beused on both sides, to be made capable of being used as a board.

12. Keeping in mind the aforesaid factual findings, let us turn toFthe judicial views dealing with the subject in question, whether relatingto gypsum board or in respect of other products, where there is derivationof some other end product.

(1) Commissioner of Sales Tax, Mumbai v. India Gypsum Ltd.(supra)

GThe Division Bench of the Bombay High Court was concernedwith a similar legal conundrum as to whether ‘gypsum board’ would fall 4 See para 2.2 of the article ‘Life Cycle Analysis of Gypsum Board and AssociatedFinishing Products’ by George J Venta, The Athena Sustainable Materials Institute,Ottawa, Canada (March 1997).

5 See Construction & Demolition Recycling Association: Gypsum Drywall, availableHat http://cdrecycling.org/materials/gypsum-wall/.

under the Entry C-41 of the Maharashtra Value Added Tax Act whichreads as ‘gypsum of all forms and descriptions’. The court opined thatthe legislature having used the phraseology, some meaning would haveto be assigned to the words by which there would bean explanation ofthe terminology. The Division Bench, relying on the case of State ofGujarat v. Sakarwala Brothers (supra) observed that the expression‘form’ was used for items with various shapes, sizes as well as uses vis-à-vis the original product. It was the chemical composition of thesubstance in question that mattered for deciding whether it fell withinthe scope of a particular Entry. Since the main composition of gypsumboard continues to be gypsum, which takes the form of the board, gypsumboard was held to fall in Entry C-41 of the Maharashtra Value AddedTax Act.

(2) Trutuf Safety Glass Industries v. Commissioner of SalesTax (supra)

This judgment has been used as an aid in the impugned order tosupport the conclusion in favour of the assessee.

’12. ……………. The word ‘form’ connotes a visible aspectsuch as shape or mode in which a thing exists or manifests itself,species, kind or variety. The use of the word ‘in all forms’ isdifferent from the expression ‘all kinds’. The conceptualdifference between the words “all kinds’ and ‘in all forms’is that the former multiplies items of the same kind whilethe latter multiplies the same commodity in different forms.The use of the word ‘in all forms’ widens the scope of theEntry.’

13. It is settled position in law that while interpreting the entry forthe purpose of taxation, recourse should not be made to thescientific meaning of the terms or expressions used but totheir popular meaning, that is to say, the meaning attachedto them by those dealing in them. This is what is known as“common parlance test’. ……………..

20. The question is not what may be supposed and has beenintended but what has been said. ‘Statutes should be construednot as theorems of Euclid”. Judge Learned Hand said, “but wordsmust be construed with some imagination of the purposes which A

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138SUPREME COURT REPORTS[2019] 1 S.C.R.

Alie behind them’. (See Lenigh Valley Coal Co. v. Yensavage[6]).………………..”

(3) State of Gujarat v. Sakarwala Brothers (supra)

BThe interpretation of Entry 47 of Schedule A to the Bombay SalesTax Act came into question as to whether patasa, harda and alchidanawere ‘forms’ of sugar containing more than 90% of sucrose. Since thechemical composition of all three was the same and they could beconverted back into sugar upon being dissolved in water, and beingsubjected to ‘appropriate processes’, the court opined in favour of theCassessee. The Bench noted with approval that in a similar lis[7] pertainingto the question of whether hydrogenated groundnut oil continued to begroundnut oil, notwithstanding the processing carried out for the purposeof rendering the oil more stable, it was opined that two conditions haveto be satisfied – firstly, it must be from groundnut oil and secondly, itDmust be oil. Since hydrogenated oil was from groundnut and, in itsessential nature it remained an oil and continued to be used for the samepurpose as groundnut oil, the hydrogenated oil did not alter its characteras oil despite being semisolid.

(4) State of Jharkhand and Ors v. LA Opala R.G. Ltd.[8]EThis court examined whether glassware manufactured by theassessee could be understood to be a ‘type of glass or glass sheet’ so asto be taxable at the rate of 3% vide notification S.O No. 25, dated25.06.2001, issued by the government of Jharkhand. It was observed asunder:

F‘22. It is a settled law that in taxing statutes the terms andexpressions must be seen in their common and popular parlanceand not be attributed their scientific or technical meanings. Incommon parlance, the two words “type” and “form” are not ofthe same import. According to the Oxford Dictionary, whereasthe meaning of the expression “types” is “kind, class, breed, group,Gfamily, genus”; the meaning of the word “form” is “visibleshape or configuration of something” or the “style, design,and arrangement in an artistic work as distinct from its 6 218 FR 547.

7 Tungabhadra Industries Ltd v. Commercial Tax Officer, Kurnool (1961) 2 SCR 14.H 8 (2014) 15 SCC 136.

content”. Similarly, Macmillan Dictionary defines “type” as “agroup of people or things with similar qualities or features thatmake them different from other groups” and “form” as “theparticular way in which something appears or exists or a shape ofsomeone or something”. Therefore, “types” are based on the broadnature of the item intended to be classified and in terms of “forms”,the distinguishable feature is the particular way in which the itemsexist. An example could be the item “wax”. The types of waxwould include animal, vegetable, petroleum, mineral or syntheticwax whereas the form of wax could be candles, lubricant wax,sealing wax, etc.’

(5) Rajasthan Roller Flour Mills Assn v. State of Rajasthan[9]

Whether flour,maida and suji would fall under the meaning ofthe item ‘wheat’ under Section 14 of the Central Sales (Tax) Act wasthe question. The relevant extract is as under:

23. The following observations of Venkataramiah, J. in RaghuramaShetty [(1) Ganesh Trading Co. v. State of Haryana, (1974) 3 SCC620 : 1974 SCC (Tax) 100 : (1973) 32 STC 623; (2) Babu RamJagdish Kumar and Co. v. State of Punjab, (1979) 3 SCC 616 :1979 SCC (Tax) 265 : (1979) 44 STC 159 and (3) State ofKarnataka v. Raghurama Shetty, (1981) 2 SCC 564 : 1981 SCC(Tax) 134 : (1981) 47 STC 369] can usefully be quoted: (SCC pp.566-7, paras 8-11) “There is no merit in the submission made onbehalf of the assesses that they had not consumed paddy whenthey produced rice from it by merely carrying out the process ofdehusking at their mills. Consumption in the true economicsense does not mean only use of goods in the production ofconsumers’ goods or final utilisation of consumers’ goodsby consumers involving activities like eating of food,drinking of beverages, wearing of clothes or using of anautomobile by its owner for domestic purposes. Amanufacturer also consumes commodities which areordinarily called raw materials when he produces semi-finished goods which have to undergo further processes ofproduction before they can be transformed into consumers’

9 1994 Supp.(1) SCC 413.

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9 1994 Supp.(1) SCC 413.

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Agoods. At every such intermediate stage of production,some utility or value is added to goods which are used asraw materials and at every such stage the raw materialsare consumed. Take the case of bread. It passes through thefirst stage of production when wheat is grown by the farmer, thesecond stage of production when wheat is converted into flour byBthe miller and the third stage of production when flour is utilizedby the baker to manufacture bread out of it. The miller and thebaker have consumed wheat and flour respectively in the courseof their business. We have to understand the word ‘consumes’in Section 6(i) of the Act in this economic sense. … At everyCstage of production, it is obvious there is consumption ofgoods even though at the end of it there may not be finalconsumption of goods but only production of goods withhigher utility which may be used in further productiveprocesses. … Applying the above test, it has to be held that theassessees had consumed the paddy purchased by them when theyDconverted it into rice which is commercially a differentcommodity.”

’24. Applying the reasoning adopted hereinabove, it must be heldthat when wheat is consumed for producing flour or maidaor suji, the commodities so obtained are differentEcommodities from wheat. The wheat loses its identity. Itgets consumed and in its place new goods/commoditiesemerge. The new goods so emerging have a higher utilitythan the commodity consumed. They are different goodscommercially speaking….’

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(6) Alladi Venkateswarlu & Ors. v. Govt. of Andhra Pradesh& Ors.[10]

Whether parched rice and puffed rice would fall under EntryG66(b) of Schedule I to the Andhra Pradesh General Sales Tax Act,1957which read ‘rice obtained from paddy that has met tax under the Act’was the question examined.

“12. Even if parched rice and puffed rice could be lookedupon as separate in commercial character from rice as grainH 10 (1978) 2 SCC 552.

offered for sale in a market, yet, keeping in view the othermatters mentioned above, it could not be presumed that itwas intended to exclude from entry 66 “rice”, which at anyrate, had not so changed its identity as not to be describableas “rice” at all. ‘Muramaralu’ was after all rice even thoughit was puffed. ‘Atukulu’ even though parched was still calledrice. We must also remember that the schedule which we haveto interpret is in the English language where the term rice is stillfound in the rendering or description of ‘palalu’ as well as that of‘muramaralu’ in the English language. And, in any case, if twointerpretations of a provision are possible, we think thatwe ought to, in such a case, apply the principle that theinterpretation which favours the assessee should bepreferred.”

(7) Tungabhadra Industries Ltd. v. The Commercial Tax Officer,Kurnool (supra)

In this judgment already referred to aforesaid, the following extractmay be useful for our purpose:

“08. But in the case of hydrogenated oil which is prepared fromrefined oil by the process of passing hydrogen into heated oil inthe presence of a catalyst (usually finely powdered nickel), twoatoms of hydrogen are absorbed. A portion of the oleic acid whichformed a good part of the content of the groundnut oil in its rawstates in(sic.)[11] converted, by the absorption of the hydrogen atoms,into stearic acid and it is this which gives the characteristicappearance as well as the semi-solid condition which it attains. Inthe language of the Chemist, an inter-molecular orconfigurational chemical change takes place which resultsin the hardening of the oil. Though it continues to be thesame edible fat that it was before the hardening, and itsnutritional properties continue to be the same, it hasacquired new properties in that the tendency to rancidity isgreatly removed, is easier to keep and to transport.”

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AThe aforesaid observations are important as inter-molecular orconfigurational chemical changes that resulted in the hardening of the oilwas held not to exclude it from the Entry.

Our view

13. On giving consideration to the matter in issue, we find that theBamended Entry 56 of Schedule IV of the RVAT, read as ‘gypsum in allits forms’, would include ‘gypsum board’ under the term ‘all its forms’.

14. We are persuaded to come to the aforesaid conclusion on thebasis that, it can hardly be doubted that a meaning has to be given to theEntry made by the legislature, expanding the original Entry from ‘gypsum’Cto ‘gypsum in all its forms’. If the object was to include only ‘gypsum’,then why would the Entry be changed to‘gypsum in all its forms’? Thecorollary would also be as to what is meant by ‘in all its forms’, as it isnot, as if mere geometrical alteration of a shape would form part of theEntry. In such a situation, the original Entry itself was comprehensiveDenough to have included it. We have noticed the view taken by theBombay High Court in an almost identical situation except that the Entrythere was ‘of all forms and descriptions’. But the discussion was moreor less confined to the expression ‘of all forms’. This court in SakarwalaBrothers (supra) observed that it was the chemical composition of thesubstance in question that mattered, to decide whether it would fall withinEthe scope of a particular Entry. In the present case, there is really nochemical change which occurs in the substance as dehydration onlyreduces the water content and thereafter, it is mixed with additives forthe purpose of increasing bonding and other related purposes.Substantively, the character of ‘gypsum’ is not changed in the mechanicalFexercise of converting it into a board along with, of course, certainchemical processes of heating and mixing, to achieve an ultimate objective.

15. The observations of this Court in Trutuf Safety GlassIndustries (supra) are of significance, where a distinction is sought tobe made between the words ‘in all forms’ as juxtaposed to the expressionG‘all kinds’. The words ‘all kinds’ are said to be restricted to multipleitems of the same kind, while the expression ‘in all forms’ is to multiplythe same commodity into different forms. Therefore, different ‘forms’of gypsum would get included in the expression ‘in all forms’.

16. A reference to the timeless statement of Hand, J. that ‘wordsmust be construed with some imagination of the purposes which lieH

behind them’, would require us to construe the expression ‘in all forms’being added to ‘gypsum’ to naturally include not only just gypsum in itsoriginal form but in different forms as well.

17. To fully understand the scope of Entry 56 of Schedule IV ofthe RVAT, we have looked into the manufacturing process of gypsumboard. A reference to the extract aforesaid would show that the initialsteps are of only crushing and grinding the gypsum whereafter it is heatedand partially dehydrated, which in turn is called ‘stucco’ or ‘Plaster ofParis’. There does not appear to be any doubt that such ‘stucco’ wouldform part of the Entry ‘in all its forms’. The unique characteristic ofstucco, when mixed with water, is that the smooth plastic mass so formedcan be molded into the desired shape, which obtains its rock-like stateon hardening. This very characteristic is stated to be used in thedevelopment and production of gypsum board. In the second step of themanufacturing process, stucco is mixed with a number of additives in anexcess amount of water to prepare a slurry, to be ultimately convertedback into a dehydrated form, before being cut into desired sizes. Notonly that, ‘gypsum board’ is defined as real gypsum between two papersheets. Will that take away from the description of gypsum? We thinknot. Even if the sheets are added, the wide description ‘in all its forms’would certainly include ‘gypsum board’.

18. In the case of Sakarwala Brothers (supra), the factum ofthere being the same chemical composition of patasa, harda andalchidana and the ability to convert them back into sugar on beingdissolved in water and on being subjected to other ‘appropriate processes’,resulted in a finding that they would be included as ’any form of sugar’.In fact, gypsum board, devoid of its top and bottom boards, can be utilized,with some processing, in a similar manner as gypsum. When the meaningof the word ‘form’ is meant to include ‘visible shape or configuration ofsomething’, as observed in State of Jharkhand (supra), we cannot seeany reason why gypsum board would not form a part of the expandedterminology ’in all its forms’.

19. In the same line, this Court in Alladi Venkateswarlu (supra),has given an expanded definition to ‘rice obtained from paddy that hasmet tax under the Act’ to include parched rice and puffed rice within theterm ‘rice’ as it had not changed its identity so as to not be describableas ‘rice’ at all. A broad interpretation was, thus sought to be given byapplying the ‘common sense’ rule of interpretation. Similarly, this Court A

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Ain Tungabhadra Industries Ltd (supra) observed that even if an inter-molecular or configurational chemical change takes place which resultsin hardening of the oil, its nutritional properties continue to be the same.Moreover, even if it acquires new properties, in the sense that the tendencyto turn rancid is greatly removed and it is easier to transport,‘hydrogenated groundnut oil’ was held not to be excluded from the originalBEntry of ‘groundnut oil’.

20. All the aforesaid examples show that wherever an expression‘in all its forms’ is used, it has resulted in an expanded meaning, which isa logical corollary of such an expression being added to the originalEntry. To take a view to the contrary in the given situation would amountCto giving no meaning to the added expression as there are really not toomany possibilities on what could have been included in such anexpression.

21. We may also note another fact which has come to our noticethat in terms of notification No.S.O.36.No.F.12(59)FD/Tax/2014-14 datedD14[th] July, 2014, the RVAT was amended to include, in Schedule V, aseparate Entry under item No.19(viii) ‘gypsum board and other falseceiling material’. Thus, the legislature by a conscious decision in 2014,sought to create a separate Entry for gypsum board, which was not thecase in respect of the assessment years in question. This, in our view,Ebelies the endeavor to include gypsum board in the residuary Entry, beforesuch specific inclusion as then there would have been no need for suchan Entry. The obvious attempt is to exclude it from ‘gypsum in all itsforms’ in Schedule IV of RVAT and create a separate Entry in ScheduleV, whereafter it would naturally be governed by the tax rate applicableto the Entry in question.F

22. We, thus, dismiss the appeals leaving it open to the parties tobear their own costs.

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Appeals dismissed.

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