BHARGAVA, J. - (1.) THESE five petitions under Article 226 of the Constitution were heard together today. One of them was presented day before yesterday and the remaining four were presented today. All these five petitions were heard together as learned counsel for the petitioners stated that the important questions arising in all these petitions were identical.
(2.) ALL these five petitions have been presented by the petitioner who challenge the validity of notifications dated the 31st of March, 1956, issued in respect of goods in which these petitioners are dealing. Those notifications were purported to be issued by the State Government in exercise of their power under section 3A(2) of the U.P. Sales Tax Act, 1948, as amended by the U.P. Sales Tax (Amendment) Ordinance, 1956. The U.P. Sales Tax (Amendment) Ordinance, 1956, in accordance with the provisions contained in it, came into force on the 1st of April 1956. That Ordinance was replaced by the U.P. Sales Tax (Amendment) Act, 1956. After that Act had been passed, the validity of those notifications was challenged in certain writ petitions before this Court and the Court held that the notifications of the 31st of March, 1956, were void. Thereafter the U.P. Sales Tax (Amendment) Act, 1957, was passed inter alia with the object of giving effect to the amended section 3A retrospectively with effect from the 31st of March, 1956. The object was to validate those notifications of 31st March, 1956. After that Act was passed, a writ petition was filed in this Court under Article 226 of the Constitution which was heard by a Full Bench of this Court. The decision of the Full Bench of this Court is reported in Firm Bangali Mal Satish Chandra Jain v. The Sales Tax Officer, Agra ([1958] 9 S.T.C. 492; 1958 A.L.J. 228). The Full Bench in that case held that the effect of the U.P. Sales Tax (Amendment) Act, 1957, no doubt, was that section 3A(2) of the U.P. Sales Tax Act, 1948, was to be deemed to be in force on the 31st of March, 1956, in the form in which it was introduced by the U.P. Sales Tax (Amendment) Ordinance, 1956, as replaced by the U.P. Sales Tax (Amendment) Act, 1956. The Full Bench came to the view that, since the new section 3A(2) was deemed to exist on 31st March, 1956, in the U.P. Sales Tax Act, 1948, the power of the State Government to issue a notification of the nature, which was issued, did exist on that date; but it further held that the notification was never purported to be issued in exercise of that power and, consequently, the notification was not valid. It was held by the Full Bench that a reading of the notification itself made it clear that it was issued in exercise of the powers conferred by section 3A of the U.P. Sales Tax Act, 1948, as amended from time to time and on the date when the notification in question was issued, section 3A(2), which was in force, was the old section without containing in it the amendments which were subsequently introduced by the U.P. Sales Tax (Amendment) Ordinance, 1956, or the U.P. Sales Tax (Amendment) Act, 1956. It was further held that the fact that, in view of the retrospective operation of the 1957 Act, the State Government must be deemed to have requisite power under the new section 3A(2) on the 31st of March, 1956, will not convert a notification issued under the old section 3A(2) into one issued under the new section. The notification itself not being under the new section, it was held that the retrospective conferment of the necessary power could not validate that notification which was not issued in exercise of that power. That notification was, therefore, declared void again by the Full Bench. After that decision by the Full Bench, the U.P. Legislature has now passed the U.P. Sales Tax (Validation) Act, 1958, which came into force on the 6th of May, 1958. Sub-section (1) of section 3 of this Act, with which we are concerned, is as follows :- "3(1) Notwithstanding any judgment, decree or order of any Court, the notification specified in Part A, Part B and Part C of the Schedule shall be deemed to have been issued in exercise of the powers conferred respectively by section 3, section 3A and section 4 of the U.P. Sales Tax Act, 1948 as if the said sections were in force on the date on which the notifications were issued in the form in which they were in force immediately before the commencement of this Act and all the said notifications shall be valid and shall be deemed always to have been valid and shall continue in force until amended, varied or rescinded by any notification issued under any of the said sections."
(3.) IT is to be kept in view that, in interpreting this provision of law, we have to accept the position, which was recognised by the Full Bench of this Court in the case of Firm Bangali Mal Satish Chandra Jain ([1958] 9 S.T.C. 492; 1958 A.L.J. 228), cited above, that the result of the earlier legislation already was that the power of issuing the noticifations of 31st March, 1956, must be deemed to have existed in the State Government on the 31st March, 1956. The Full Bench declared the notification, which was questioned before it, void on the ground that the notification had not been issued in exercise of that power which was to be deemed to exist. The language of section 3 of the U.P. Sales Tax (Validation) Act, 1958, quoted above clearly indicates that this Act has now been enacted just to get over the difficulty which was pointed out by the Full Bench in that case. As a question of fact, there can be no doubt that the notifications of the 31st of March, 1956, were not and could not have been issued in exercise of the power which actually came into existence after the 31st of March, 1956, as a result of the subsequent legislation and which, by the retrospective application of that legislation, only created a fiction of law that that power must be deemed to have existed on the 31st of March, 1956. By section 3 of the Act now in question, another legal fiction has been created and that fiction of law is that the power, which was actually and in fact, not exercised under the amended section 3A(2), is to be deemed to have been exercised under that amended provision of law.;