State of Kerala &
Ors. Vs. Mini Shamsudin & ANR. [2009] INSC 1 (2 January 2009)
Judgment
IN THE SUPREME COURT
OF INDIA CIVIL APPELLATE JURISDICTION CIVIL APPEAL NO. 594 OF 2009 (Arising out
of SLP(C) No.2855 of 2009) (CC No. 973/09) State of Kerala & Ors.
...Appellant(s) Versus Mini Shamsudin & Ors. ...Respondent(s) ORDER Dr.
ARIJIT PASAYAT,J.
Heard learned counsel
for the petitioner.
Delay condoned.
Leave granted.
In view of the
decision of the Constitution Bench of this Court in Sunrise Associates vs.
Govt. of NCT of Delhi & Ors reported in 2006 (5) SCC 603, we find no merit
in this appeal which is accordingly dismissed. It need to be stated that this
Court in the said case inter alia held as follows:
"We have noted
earlier that all the statutory definitions of the word `goods' in the State
Sales Tax Laws have uniformly excluded, inter alia,
-2- actionable
claims from the definition for the purpose of the Act. Were actionable claims
etc., not otherwise includible in the definition of `goods' there was no need
for excluding them. In other words, actionable claims are `goods' but not for
the purpose of the Sales Tax Acts and but for this statutory exclusion, an
actionable claim would be `goods' or the subject matter of ownership.
Consequently, an actionable claim is movable property and `goods' in the wider
sense of the term but a sale of an actionable claim would not be subject to the
sales tax law.
xxxxxx xxxxxx xxxxx A
lottery ticket has no value in itself. It is a mere piece of paper. Its value
lies in the fact that it represents a chance or a right to a conditional
benefit of winning a prize of a greater value than the consideration paid for
the transfer of that chance. It is nothing more than a token or evidence of
this right. The Court in H.Anraj, as we have seen, held that a lottery ticket
is a slip of paper of memoranda evidencing the transfer of certain rights. We
agree.
xxxxxxx xxxxxxx
xxxxxx -3- The question is, what is this right which the ticket represents?
There can be no doubt that on purchasing a lottery ticket, the purchaser would
have a claim to a conditional interest in the prize money which is not in the
purchaser's possession. The right would fall squarely within the definition of
an actionable claim and would therefore be excluded from the definition of
`goods' under the Sale of Goods Act and the Sales tax statutes."
....................J.(Dr.
ARIJIT PASAYAT)
...................J.(ASOK
KUMAR GANGULY)
New
Delhi,
February
2, 2009.
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