I I M Vs. STATE OF GUJARAT

JUDGEMENT

(1.) INDIAN Institute of Management, Ahmedabad (IIMA) along with Dean and Acting Director has approached this Court seeking a declaration that Item (1) of Part-I of Schedule I to `the Bombay Electricity Duty Act, 1958' (for short `the Act') as ultravires Article 14 of the Constitution of India and to strike down the same as such, and also for a writ of certiorari quashing and setting aside the decision taken by the respondents to withdraw concessional rate of electricity duty to the petitioner-Institute and also for other consequential reliefs.

(2.) PETITIONER-INSTITUTE is an educational, research, professional and technical Institute of national importance which is an autonomous body registered under `the Societies Registration Act, 1860'. The primary object of the petitioner-Institute is to provide educational facilities for training young men and women for career in management and related fields in any form of organization, to improve decision making schemes and administrative competence in different management fields and to create knowledge through research, both applied and conceptual, and to assist organizations in solving their management problems. Petitioner-Institute also conducts various kinds of programmes, such as, doctoral level programme known as `fellow Programme in Management', `post Graduate Programme in Management', `faculty Development Programme', `management Development Programme', etc. Over and above, the Institute also had arrangement till 31st December 1992 with Gujarat University to enable its Professors to guide students registered with the University for Ph. D in Management.

(3.) PETITIONER-INSTITUTES's case is that in an arbitrary manner the benefit of concessional electricity duty extended to it was taken away from December 1992. From the very beginning, Institute was charged electricity duty @ 60% of the consumption charges, but from February 1983 onwards petitioner-Institute was charged electricity duty at the rate of 40% of consumption charges till the year 1995.