LIPTON INDIA LIMITED Vs. UNION OF INDIA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The petitioner is engaged in the manufacture inter alia of vanaspati. It has a plant at Ghaziabad in Uttar Pradesh.

(2.) With a view to ensure supply of vanaspati at a uniform rate throughout the country, the government of India had evolved, in consultation with themanufacturers of vanaspati, a scheme known as "all India voluntary price control system", whereunder the manufacturers of vanaspati were obliged to sell vanaspati at a uniform price throughout the country. Oil is the main raw material for manufacturing vanaspati. Part of the oil so required was being imported through the agency of State Trading Corporation and sold to various manufacturers all over the country. Very often, the STC depot, nearest to the plant, was designated as the source from which the manufacturer was to draw the supply of imported oil. Since the manufacturers were obliged to sell vanaspati at a uniform price, the government of India proposed to supply imported oil to all the manufacturers, wherever their plants are situated, at a uniform price. It is this aspect which gave rise to certain problems. The rates of sales tax on the sale of oil were not uniform throughout the country. Some State enactments did not levy any tax while others levied tax at rates ranging from 1% to 4%. Complaining of discrimination on this score, a number of vanaspati manufacturers approached the High courts by way of writ petitions which were all transferred to this court and numbered as Transferred Case No. 7 of 1981 etc. Some writ petitions were filed directly in this court under Article 32 of the Constitution. All these matters came to be disposed of by this court by order dated 8/2/1982 which reads as follows:

(3.) Pursuant to the observations made in the above order, the government of India constituted a committee known as "parmeshwaran Committee" (hereinafter referred to as 'committee') with the following terms of reference: