HINDUSTAN GUM AND CHEMICALS LIMITED Vs. STATE OF HARYANA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The appellant in this appeal by certificate is a limited company having its registered office at Calcutta. It is carrying on the business of processing guar at its factory situated at Bhiwani, formerly within the State of Punjab and now in the State of Haryana, and exporting the outer shell to the United States of America. The inner part of guar is used as fodder for cattle in India. For the purpose of processing, the appellant has to bring into its factory premises guar from outside mandis.

(2.) Prior to August 10, 1965, the appellant's factory was situated outside the local limits of the Municipal Committee of Bhiwani, but with effect from that date by reason of the extension of the local limits of the said Municipal Committee by the Notification No. MCII (XIIL)-II-61/31330 dated August 10, 1965 issued under Section 5(3) of the Punjab Municipal Act, 1911 (Punjab Act No. III of 1911) (hereinafter referred to as 'the Act') by the then Punjab Government, the factory premises came within the municipal limits of Bhiwani. The said Notification was published in the Punjab Government Gazette dazed August 13, 1965 and with effect from that date the Municipal Committee of Bhiwani commenced to impose and collect octroi from the appellant in respect of the guar imported by the appellant into its factory within the extended municipal limits of Bhiwani from outside. The appellant resisted the levy of octroi. When its attempts to get exemption from payment of octroi failed, it filed a writ petition under Article 226 of the Constitution before the High Court of Punjab and Haryana in Civil Writ No. 2743 of 1968 questioning the imposition of octroi on several grounds one of them being that without complying with the legal formalities necessary for the imposition of octroi in the extended area of the municipality, it was not open to the Municipal Committee to levy octroi on guar brought by the appellant into its factory from outside. The petition was contested by the State Government and the Municipal Committee of Bhiwani. That petition was dismissed by the High Court of Punjab and Haryana by its judgment dated May 18, 1970. Aggrieved by the judgment of the High Court, the appellant has filed the above appeal after obtaining the necessary certificate under Art. 133(1)(a) of the Constitution from the High Court.

(3.) Section 5 of the Act, as it stood at the relevant time, read as follows:-