DIRECTOR OF INDUSTRIES GOVERNMENT OF ANDHRA PRADESH HYDERABAD Vs. KURNOOL INDUSTRIAL CORPORATION NAVDYAL

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Identical questions arise in these writ appeals. We will, therefore, consider them in a common judgment. Our learned brother, Lakshmaiah, J., did the same to the five writ petitions from which these appeals arose.

(2.) The learned Judge allowed the writ petitions and the Director of Industties, Government of Andhra Pradesn, the 1st respondent in them, along with his Assistant Director at Nandyal have preferred these appeals impleading the petitioners in the writ petitioi s as 1st respondent and the Joint Chief Controller of Imports and Exports, Iron and Steel Division, Madras, who was the 2nd respondent there, as the 2nd respondent here also. We will now refer to the parties as they were arrayed in the writ petitions.

(3.) The petitioners are Small Scale Units which manufacture hospital equipment, dairy and chemical equipment, automobile components etc. We will here notice the substance of the material averments in the writ petitions. The Units require stainless steel sheets but they are not available in the country and have to be imported from abroad. In the beginning the Assistant Estate Engineer, Industrial Estate, used to inspect the factory and after satisfying himself as to the existence of the requisite machinery, he was making recommendations to the Director of Industries for the supply of sheets. Basing oa those reports the 1st respondent used to issue essentiality certificates to the 2nd respondent requesting him to permit the petitioners to import sheets of specified value. After 1965-66 however, the Units themselves were making direct applications to the 2nd respondent on the basis of a consumption certificate issued by a Chartered Accountant and stocks were bsing released on the basis of such certificates. From 1971-72 there was again a change in the policy. From then onwards, a certificate from the 1st respondent saying that the required machinery was in existence and installed in the Units was requited for the 2nd respondent to issue the permits. The idea behind this requirement is to see that the scarce commodity of the sheets should not be given to an industrial unit which was not in a position to utilise them for wart of machinery. In the light of this change in the policy, the petitioners applied for the supply of these sheets but they were not given their quotas. This Was the result of certain secret correspondence between the 1st respondent and the 2nd respondent which was based on no enquiry. The 1st respondent has no jurisdiction or authority to write any such letters. He did not even communicate the grounds to the petitioners before he wrote those letters nor did he conduct an enquiry, either open or secret. In June, 1972, two expert panels were sent to make an inspection of all such Units in the State and that Commission found that the requisite machinery Was installed in the petitioners' Units. The Assistant Director of Industries at Cuddapah made recommendations on that basis. However, the 1st respondent, for reasons not easily discernible, raised further queries to which also the Assistant Director sent replies immediately. The 1st respondent, however, took a very hostile, unreasonable and discriminatory attitude towards the petitioners' Units despite the recommendations of the Deputy and Joint Directors of Industries and refused to issue machinery certificates. There was no justification whatsoever for the 1st respondent not to take any action even alter the panel's findings were brought to his notice more than once. Consequently, several small scale units filed writ petitions in this Court and obtained interim directions to the 1st respondent to issue machinery certificates. The petitioners themselves filed similar writ petitions. On receipt of the orders of this Court, which were favourable to the petitioners, the 1st respondsnt, for the first time after the trouble arose, issued machinery certificates. Even then, acting very unreasonably and presumably on grounds of personal vengeance, the 1st respondent is understood to have written to the 2nd respondent that the release orders have to be issued only for the period 1973-74 and not foi the back periods. This letter of the 1st respondent is in abuse of his authority to do which he had no power. In the circumstances, it was improper for the 1st respondent to write such a letters to the 2nd respondent and equally wrong on the part of the 2nd respondent to machanically act upon those letters. The order of the Joint Chief Controller dated 6th August, 1974 would show that he was acting mechanically and almost to the dictates and directions of the 1st respondent. The underlying purpose of the policy was to see that the sheets were given only to Units which had the mechanical capacity to utilise them. Though the petitioners' Units had that capacity they were denied to them contrary to the law. The 1st respondent and his Assistant Director at Nandyal were informed that the petitioners had purchased certain equipment on 14th June, 1972, and on 28th December, 1972, and other dates; still he, acting mala fide and in a revengeful way, falsely reported to the 2nd respondent that the machinery certificate, which he had issued as per the orders of this Court, covered only the period 1973-74.