Page 140 - GSTL_27th August 2020_Vol 39_Part 4

466 GST LAW TIMES [ Vol. 39
“26. The word “plant”, though an ordinary English word, is not
altogether an easy word to construe. It may have a more or less ex-
tensive meaning according to its context. It has come up for inter-
pretation before various courts on numerous occasions in the con-
text of different statutes and the catena of judicial decisions shows
that it is a word of wide and varied import susceptible of diverse
meanings depending upon its setting in the scheme of the statute.
Almost all cases bearing upon the interpretation of the word
“plant” decided in England and in this country were cited before us
and the following enumeration would show as to what an amazing
variety of articles, objects or things have been held to be plant or not
plant.
PLANT
(i) Horse, Yarmouth v. France; (ii) knives and lasts used in manufac-
ture of shoes, Hinton v. Maden & Ireland Ltd.; (iii) aircraft engine
which was being dismantled, Watts v. Enfield Rolling Mills (Alumini-
um) Ltd.; (iv) movable office partitions, Jarrold v. John Good & Sons
Ltd.; (v) concrete dry dock, Inland Revenue Commissioner v. Barclay,
Curle & Co. Ltd.; (vi) electrical fans and other office appliances,
Sundaram Motors Pvt. v. Commissioner of Income tax; (vii) poles, ca-
bles conductors and switch boards for distribution of electricity,
Commissioner of Income tax v. Indian Turpentine and Rosin Co. Ltd.;
(viii) light fittings, ceiling and pedestal fans and water pipe fittings
in a hotel, Commissioner of Income tax v. Jagadeeschandran & Co.; (ix)
sanitary and pipeline fittings in a hotel, Commissioner of Income tax v.
Taj Mahal Hotel.”
(l) That, the common definition of the term “equipment” is “a set of
equipment or tools or a machine that is used for a particular purpose”. The
Appellant would also like to cite meaning of the above term from
different dictionaries as under :
“Apparatus - It is a collection or set of materials, instruments, ap-
pliances or machinery designed for a particular use (Mav. Web.
Dic.). A compound instrument designed to carry out a specific func-
tion. (McGraw Hill Dic. of Sc. & Tech. Terms).”
(m) The Appellant further wishes to quote further on the meaning of
apparatus from the Webster’s Encyclopedic Unabridged Dictionary
of the English Language which reads as under :-
“a group or aggregate of instruments, machinery, tools, materials
etc., having a particular function or intended for a specific use. 2.
any complex instrument or machine for a particular purpose. 3. any
system or systematic organization of activities, functions, processes,
etc., directed toward a specific goal; the apparatus of government;
espionage apparatus. 4. Physiol, a group of structurally different
organs working together in the performance of a particular func-
tion : the digestive apparatus.”
(n) The Appellant also wishes to rely on the definition cited in various
case laws. As per the P. Ramanatha Aiyar’s Legal Lexicon :
“The word apparatus would certainly mean the compound instru-
ment or chain of series if instruments designed to carry out specific
function or for a particular use (Commer. of Customs v. C-NET Com-
munication (1) (P) Ltd., (2007) 12 SCC 72, 82-83, para 36).
GST LAW TIMES  27th August 2020  140