- (1.) The petitioner has approached this Court through the present writ petition for quashing the orders of assessment (Annexures P-3 & P-4), through which the house tax payable by the FCI has been reassessed.
(2.) The petitioner-Food Corporation of India has various branches in the Districts of Punjab and Haryana, The present issue relates to Faridkot Branch, where the petitioner-Corporation has food storage depot at Kotkapura situated within the limits of Municipal Committee of Kotkapura. The petitioner-Corporation had constructed a godown for storage of food-grains. This godown was located in the territorial limits of Municipal Committee Kotkapura. The godown was assessed to house tax after its completion by the respondent- Committee and the tax of Rs. 1,10,640/- was levied on the property by. way of house tax being annual rental value of the property. This assessment continued for the year 1986-87. Thereafter, the respondent-Committee issued a notice dated 17.2.1987 under Section 65 of the Punjab Municipal Act, 1911 (for short 'the Act') proposing to enhance the annual rental value of Rs. 28,71,720/- and thus, proposed to levy house tax of Rs. 4,30,326/- w.e.f. 1.4.1987. The notice was issued to the petitioner and it was required to file objections to the said notice.
(3.) The petitioner filed detailed objections before the Executive Officer, Municipal Committee, Kotkapura, against this order of proposed assessment. As per the petitioner, there was no basis for re-assessment as there was no alteration or addition, which had been made in the property since the date of last assessment. The case set up by the petitioner, thus, was that the assessment could not have been re-opened in absence of alteration or addition made in the property. It is averred that keeping in view the provisions of the Rent Act, assessment could not be revised.;