- (1.) A Division Bench of Madhya Pradesh High Court, quashed on a writ petition, the bill and notice of demand, issued against the respondent under Section 164 of the M. P. Municipalities Act, 1961, on the basis that the fees sought to be collected from the respondent fetched him no quid pro quo.
(2.) The respondent herein granted by auction a lease by the Municipal Council, Waraseoni for a year from 1-4-1971 to 31-3-1972 for recovery of cattle registration fee, popularly known in that region as "Baithaki". The contracted money was Rs. 1,75,000/-. The respondent did not pay the whole and withheld a sum of Rs. 29,592.63. The Municipal Council was constrained to start recovery proceedings against the respondent under the provisions of the Act. A bill for the amount was sent to the respondent under Section 164(2) and a demand notice under Section 164(3) was also issued against the respondent. The respondent seeking quashing of the bill and the demand notice approached the High Court of Madhya Pradesh under Article 226 of the Constitution, which quashed the bill and the demand notice on the premise stated earlier.
(3.) Two points were raised before the High Court; (i) that the fee imposed bore no correlation to the service rendered and being in the nature of tax was, therefore, invalid; and (ii) no lease could be granted for recovery of such fee when the fee itself was invalid. A question consequential in nature was also raised that since the said contracted sum of Rupees 1,75,000/- compositely related to cattle registration fee as well as market fee, the portion representing market fee could not be made out if imposition of cattle registration fee was held beyond the power of the Municipal Council. SeQually it was urged that the market fee too, needed to be quashed on account of its being inextricable added up in the contracted amount. The High Court, seemingly, relying upon a Full Bench decision of that Court in Dhaniram v. Janapada Sabha, Janjgir, 1965 MPLJ 408, held cattle registration fee to be invalid because it was thought that the imposition of such fee, independent as it was, on the price fetched for an animal, bore no correlation to the service rendered by Janpada Sabha, and, therefore, could not be described as 'fee'. In the instant case, the Municipal Council, did not specifically state in its return as to what services it rendered to the sellers and buyers of animals and what the purpose for which the fee was imposed. The return was general in terms. It was, therefore, spelt out by the High Court that there was an implied admission that the fee collected was for purposes of general revenue.;