The Larger Bench of the Customs, Excise and Service Tax Appellate Tribunal (‘CESTAT’) has in its decision delivered on 25 May 2021 held that notional cost towards freight charges is not required to be added to the value of Aviation Turbine Fuel (‘ATF’) remaining in the aircraft after its international flight into India. The Revenue department had added 20% to the FOB value of ATF as cost of transportation under Rule 10(2) of the Customs Valuation (Determination of Value of Imported Goods) Rules, 2007 (‘Valuation Rules’).

The Supreme Court, in its recent judgment, has finally settled a long pending issue by holding that contracts which cover works other than civil works and do not involve any construction, do not attract cess under the Building and Other Construction Workers’ Welfare Cess Act, 1996. The Apex Court in the decision in the case of UP Power Transmission Corporation Limited v. CG Power and Industrial Solutions Limited [Judgement dated 12 May 2021] clarified that mere installation and/or erection of pipelines, equipment for generation, transmission, or distribution of power, electric wires, transmission towers, etc., which do not involve construction work, are not amenable to levy of such cess.

The Securities Appellate Tribunal has held that mere ‘forwarded as received’ WhatsApp message circulated on a group regarding quarterly financial results of a Company, closely matching with the vital statistics, some time before the publication of the same, not amounts to an unpublished price sensitive information (‘UPSI’) under SEBI (Prohibition of Insider Trading) Regulations, 2015.