KASHYAP ZIP IND Vs. UNION OF INDIA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The petitioner seeks special leave to appeal to this court from the order dated 7/04/1992 made by the High court of Delhi in C. R. No. 2032 of 1992 and connected cases disposing of a batch of writ petitions. This special leave petition is confined to the order insofar as it relates to C. R. No. 2032 of 1992.

(2.) Respondents 1 and 2 are the main contesting parties and are duly served. But, they have chosen to remain unrepresented. The question raised before the High court in the writ petition, as rightly observed by the High court, was concluded by the pronouncement of this court.

(3.) The correctness of the dismissal of the writ petition is not assailed by the petitioners. Their grievance is against that part of the order by which the High court directed the petitioner to pay interest on the amount of duty for the period during which the stay granted by the High court was in operation. The occasion for imposing a liability for interest arose this way: In the writ petition, the petitioners had sought before and were granted by the court an interim order staying the recovery of the disputed duty, upon terms as to security by way of execution of bonds and furnishment of bank guarantees. The High court while dismissing the writ petition, directed the bank guarantees and the bonds to be enforced and took note of the fact that the petitioners had kept back the duty during the pendency of the proceedings, and felt persuaded to the view that, in the circumstances of the case, the respondents should be entitled to interest for the period during which the duties were withheld. The High court felt that even after the matter was finally decided by this court in 1985, the petitioner continued to enjoy the benefit of stay and did not move the court to have the matter disposed of. The operative part of the order of the High court reads: