PAN MERCHANTS WHOLESALE COMMISSION AGENTS ASSOCIATION HYDERABAD Vs. MANDAL REVENUE OFFICER MUSHEERABAD HYDERABAD

JUDGEMENT

(1.) In all these writ petitions, the power of the Agricultural Market Committee, Hyderabad to levy and collect market fees from the petitioners herein, the commission agents who carry on business of selling betel leaves as commission agents of the growers in "Cyan Bagh", Hyderabad, a private market owned by them is questioned.

(2.) The members of the 'Pan Merchants Wholesale Commission Agents Association," Hyderabad are licenced commission agents carrying on the trade of selling betel leaves on behalf of the growers in the private market "Gyan Bagh" situated in Sitarampet, Hyderabad. They plead that the private market "Gyan Bagh" is owned by them, that they have been carrying on the trade in betel leaves as commission agents in that market from time immemorial and that no facilities whoatsoever have been provided so far in that market by the Agricultural Market Committee, Hyderabad, it is further stated that "Gyan Bagh" has not been so far established as a market proper under sub- section (3) of Section 4 of the Andhra Pradesh Agricultural (Produce & Livestock) Markets Act, 1966 (for Short the Act)

(3.) In exercise of the powers conferred by clause (i) of Section 2 of the Act, the State Government declared betel leaves to be agricultural produce for the purpose of the Act in G.O. Ms. No. 323, Food & Agriculture (Agri-IV) Department, dated February 15, 1968. "Agricultural Produce" is defined in Section 2 (i). It "means anything produced from land in the course of agriculture or horticulture and includes forest produce or any produce of like nature either processed or un-processed and declared by the Government by notification to be agricultural produce for the purposes of this Act." The validity of the notification declaring betel leaves to be agricultural produce was upheld by this Court by the judgment dated October 20,1975 in W.P. No. 5221 of 1973, which was fled by the petitioners herein.