Report No. 61
10.2. Amendment regarding coal.-
In this connection, an amendment regarding coal may be referred to. In one case,1 the Supreme Court had held that the expression "coal" in section 14 of the Central Sales Tax Act, 1956 included charcoal. But States had been treating charcoal as a non-declared commodity, and the need for amending the law and for giving retrospective effect to the amendment (to safeguard State revenues) arose. But, it is stated, the matter was not free from doubt. The amendment2 was drafted as below, at the Select Committee stage of the 1971 Bill.
"(a) for clause (i), the following clause shall be, and shall be deemed always to have been substituted, namely:
"(i) coal, including coke in all its forms, but excluding charcoal:
Provided that during the period commencing on the 3rd day of February, 1967 and ending with the date of commencement of section 11 of the Central Sales Tax (Amendment) Act, 1972, this clause shall have effect subject to the modification that the words "but excluding charcoal" shall be omitted."
1. Commissioner of Sales Tax, Madhya Pradesh v. Jaswant Singh Charan Singh, (Feb. 23, 1967) 19 STC 469.
2. Central Sales Tax (Amendment) Bill, 1971, which led to the Amendment Act of 1972.
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