(1.) Heard Mr. Mohan Jain, learned Senior Counsel assisted by Mr. Manish Mathur, Mr. Alok Kapoor and Mr. Prashant Singh Atal, learned counsels for the petitioner and Mr. Rakesh Dwivedi, learned Senior Counsel assisted by Mr. Subhash Vidyarthi, learned counsel for the opposite party No.3, Mr. S.K.Kalia, learned Senior Counsel assisted by Mr. Sameer Kalia, learned counsel for opposite party No.4, Mr. Jaspreet Singh, learned counsel for opposite party No.5, Mr. Anurag Singh, learned counsel for the opposite party No.6 and Mr. Jaideep Narain Mathur, learned Senior Counsel assisted by Mr. Dhruv Mathur and Mr. Amit Kumar Singh Bhadauria, learned counsels for opposite party No.7 as well as learned Additional Chief Standing Counsel.
(2.) The petitioner is a Company registered under the Companies Act 1956. The petitioner has claimed to be busy in the business of manufacturing of country liquor since the year 1942. The State Government on 11 Feb. 2009 framed Excise Policy for the year 2009-10. The Excise Year starts from 1st April of every year and ends on 31st March of every year. In view of the policy laid down by the State Government the Excise Commissioner, Uttar Pradesh amended the Uttar Pradesh Excise (Settlement of Licenses for Wholesale of Country Liquor) Rules, 2002. It issued a notification dated 13 Feb. 2009, whereby it framed the Uttar Pradesh Excise (Settlement of Licenses for Wholesale of Country Liquor) (Fourth Amendment) Rules, 2009, which continued till the next amendment i.e. Fifth amendment, which was made in the Rules by Notification dated 31 March 2011.
(3.) Since the State Government has changed its policy to some extent for the Excise year 2012-13 by amending the Rules, the State Government framed Uttar Pradesh Excise (Settlement of Licenses for Wholesale Country Liquor) (Fifth Amendment) Rules, 2011. Rules 2011 and substituted new provisions of Rule 6(1) in place of old provisions. We quote new provisions of Rule 6 as under:-