MUNICIPAL COMMITTEE KHURAI Vs. STATE OF M P

JUDGEMENT

(1.) - This application under Article 226 of the Constitution is by the Municipal Committee of Khurai and by two other petitioners, one of whom claims to be an agriculturist selling his agricultural produce at Khurai and neighbouring villages and the other claims to be a merchant doing business in fodder. By this application they challenge the constitutionality of the Madhya Pradesh Agricultural Produce Markets Act, 1960 (hereinafter referred to as the Act), and the validity of four notifications issued by the Government with regard to the establishment of a market for regulating the purchase and sale of agricultural produce on the area specified in two of the notifications.

(2.) After the coming into force of the Act in 1960, the Government issued a notification on 22nd May 1961 in the exercise of its powers under section 3 (1) of the Act declaring its intention to establish a market for regulating the purchase and sale of agricultural produce specified in the schedule to the notification, on the area mentioned in the notification. The notification invited objections and suggestions, within a period of one month from the date of the publication of notification to the intended proposal of establishing a market. On a consideration of such of the objections as were received, the Government issued another notification on 13th September 1962 under section 3 (3) of the Act establishing a market at Khurai, on the area comprising the village Patwari circle from Nos. 37 to 99 of Khurai Tehsil of Sagar District, for regulating the purchase and sale of agricultural produce specified in the schedule to that notification. On 18th September 1962 another notification was issued by the Government under section 3 (4) of the Act with regard to the declaration of certain areas as principal market yard and sub-market yards, one for cattle and another for grass and fodder. This notification was followed by another notification issued on 18th September 1962 under section 8 constituting a market committee for the market area.

(3.) The petitioners in general contend that the various provisions of the Act imposed unreasonable restrictions on the right of cultivators and merchants to carry on trade in agricultural produce and thus infringed their fundamental right guaranteed under Article 19 (1) (g) of the Constitution; that the heavy fees payable to the market committee for taking out licences for trading imposed a heavy burden on trade in the regulated commodities resulting in unreasonable restriction on the rights of the merchants to carry on their trade; that the notification issued on 22nd May 1961 by the Government purporting to act under section 3(1) of the Act was not in conformity with the provisions of that section; that the area, which was declared to be the market area, was never used for the purposes of any market before the market in question was established; that, therefore, the Municipal Committee could not be asked under section 14 of the Act to transfer the market area to the market committee; that the land over which the market was established could not even vest under sub-section (2) of section 14 in the market committee as that sub-section must give way to the provisions of sections 100 and 109 of the Madhya Pradesh Municipalities Act, 1961, which was placed on the statute book later than the Act; and that section 14 of the Act being repugnant to Article 31 (2) of the Constitution was illegal and ultra vires.