IT LOOKS as if Oxford University Press may finally lose the spurious charitable status and consequent tax exemption it has enjoyed internationally since the late 1970s (much to the annoyance of its purely commercial competitors) with the Indian department of taxation (IDT) having won the first stage of its legal battle to make OUP pay like any other business.

The Press has appealed to the supreme court in Delhi and engaged an eminent counsel to argue its case. However, it is already clear that it will have a fight on its hands, as the IDT is being assisted by one Andrew Malcolm (see Eyes passim).

Malcolm spent five ultimately successful years pursuing the Press through the courts for breach of contract after it went back on a commitment to publish his philosophy book Making Names, and so is not the type to give up easily. OUP boss Henry Reece must now wonder if his predecessors could have saved him a lot of trouble simply by publishing Malcolm's book all those years ago.

Click for the INDIAN SUPREME COURT JUDGMENT. The Indian Court Archive version (contains a number of typographical errors; link takes you out of www.akme) or for the Akme (corrected) version.

Click for other similar reports: Oxford Times, Oxford Mail, The Bookseller.

Click for a photo of Oxford House, Mumbai, India, OUP's Indian HQ since 1912, now to be sold to the Taj Hotel to pay off its back tax.

Click for the next item in the Malcolm v Oxford saga or a follow-up piece, 9th March 2001.