State of Orissa v. M/s B. Engineers & Builders Ltd. & Ors.
Background
A construction company executed works contracts for the Government of Orissa and had sales tax deducted from its running bills, which the government reimbursed for a few years under a 1986 circular. Later, the government reversed its position through a 2001 circular, declaring that sales tax on a "completed item of work" (an immovable property) was not reimbursable, and demanded recovery of past reimbursements. The contractor successfully challenged this reversal in the High Court, and the State appealed to the Supreme Court.
Decision Breakdown
The Supreme Court held that the contract's Clause 45.2 clearly entitled the contractor to reimbursement of sales tax actually levied and paid on the "taxable turnover" of the works contract (not on the entire turnover), and this operated independently of a separate clause requiring the contractor to have already built ordinary material taxes into its bid price. The Court found the government's 2001 circular reinterpreting the clause to deny reimbursement was an unjustified "vacillating" reversal of its earlier 1986 position and could not override the plain contractual terms or the settled constitutional position on taxing works contracts (following Builders' Association and Gannon Dunkerley). The appeal was dismissed, upholding the contractor's right to reimbursement.
Lesson Learnt
When a government contract contains a specific tax-reimbursement clause, the government cannot unilaterally reinterpret or reverse it years later through an internal circular to avoid honoring contractual commitments: the actual wording of the contract, not shifting departmental views, governs the obligation.