JUDGMENT Satish Chandra, J.
1. The question of law which requires consideration in this reference is whether handloom (kargha) and its parts are machinery and machinery parts or unclassified articles. The reference relates to the assessment year 1965-66. The assessee carries on business in handloom machinery and its parts besides charkha, etc. The assessing authority accepted the turnover disclosed by the assessee. Up to 30th September, 1965, the turnover was assessed at 2 per cent as an unclassified item. With effect from 1st October, 1965, it was assessed as machinery at 6 per cent in view of the notification dated 1st October, 1965, issued under Section 3-A of the U. P. Sales Tax Act. The assessee went up in appeal, but failed. Thereafter, he preferred a revision on the ground that handloom (kargha) sold by him was not machinery within the meaning of Section 3-A and, as such, was not taxable at 6 per cent.
2. The Judge (Revisions) held that inasmuch as the handloom was a mechanical contrivance used for obtaining quick and better results by converting yarn into new products like saree, chadar, etc., it was a machinery.
3. It is undisputed that the article sold by the assessee is used for making handloom cloth out of yarn. It is manipulated by hand but the manual manipulation results in several parts of the article moving at the same time to convert yarn into a piece of cloth. The various processes involved in the making of the cloth happen mainly because one portion of the article is manipulated manually. The question is whether this article could be termed "machinery" within the meaning of the aforesaid notification. The Act, or the Rules, or the notification do not define the term "machinery".
4. It will be proper to understand its common meaning. In Engineering Traders v. State of Uttar Pradesh [1973] U.P.T.C. 91, a Full Bench of this Court held that "machinery in generic sense would include all appliances and instruments whereby energy or force is transmitted and transformed from one point to another". According to the dictionary meaning, the term "machinery" means "machine in general or a functioning unit". According to Webster's Dictionary, machinery means "an instrument (as a lever) designed to transmit and modify the application of power, force and motion". In this sense, the term "machinery" will include simple appliance like lever to complicated machinery employed in mills and factories.
5. In this context the handloom or kargha sold by the assessee would fall within the meaning of "machinery" or its part because they transmit and transform force or energy from one point to another point and place. Since the commodity in question is machinery and its part, they could not be validly taxed as an unclassified item. The learned counsel for the assessee urged that the handlooms were liable to be assessed as timber products within the meaning of the notification dated 1st July, 1962. The question whether the handloom (kargha) is a timber product is outside the purview of the question referred to us, hence we are unable to deal with this problem.
6. In the result, we answer the question by saying that the handloom (kargha) is taxable as machinery and machinery parts and not as an unclassified item.
7. The Commissioner of Sales Tax would be entitled to his costs, which we assess at Rs. 100.