Brief case: Northeastern states to refund education cess

A weekly selection of key court orders

The Supreme Court (SC) has asked the central excise department to refund the education cess and higher education cess which were paid by industries in the northeastern states, along with excise duty. Once the excise duty itself was exempted from levy, the cess should not be collected, the court stated while allowing the appeals of scores of firms which set up industrial units attracted by the incentives offered by the government. In order to encourage the business community to set up manufacturing units in industrially backward states such as Jammu & Kashmir, Assam, Meghalaya, Tripura, Mizoram, Manipur, Nagaland and Arunachal