SARJOODEVI Vs. COMMISSIONER, SALES TAX

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS is an application under articles 226 and 227 of the Constitution of India for the issue of a writ of certiorari for quashing an order dated 8 August 1961 of the Board of Revenue rejecting four appeals preferred by the petitioners against four orders of the Appellate Assistant Commissioner, Sales Tax, on the ground that they were all barred by time.

(2.) THE facts and circumstances in which the petitioners filed the appeals before the Board of Revenue have been stated in the order dated 11 March 1964 pronounced by this Court in M.P. No. 3 of 1964. It is not necessary to repeat those facts. As is evident from the order dated 11 March 1964 in M.P. No. 3 of 1964 and the decision of this Court in Naihulal Chhotelal vs. Deputy Commissioner of Sales Tax and another 1962 RN 291 = 1962 JLJ 460 = (1962) 13 STC 853, the appeals which the petitioners first presented before the Deputy Commissioner of Sales Tax were validity presented before the authority competent to decide the second appeals, and it was as a result of sections 7 and 9 of the Madhya Pradesh General Sales Tax (Amendment and Validation) Act, 1962 (hereinafter called the Amendment Act), which came into force on 15 August 1962 that the Board of Revenue acquired jurisdiction in the matter of entertaining and disposal of second appeals from a retrospective date viz. 1 April 1959. The appeals which the petitioners first presented before the Deputy Commissioner of Sales Tax after 1 April 1959 and which the Deputy Commissioner declined to entertain on an erroneous view of the law, were re -presented before the Board of Revenue on 21 November 1960, when the memoranda of appeal were received through post by the Board of Revenue. The Deputy Commissioner of Sales Tax, no doubt made an order returning the memoranda of appeal for presentation to the Board of Revenue and the petitioner accordingly filed the memoranda of appeal before the Board of Revenue. But such an order for return of the memoranda of appeal and their re -presentation before the Board of Revenue was not necessary when the Deputy Commissioner of Sales Tax had jurisdiction to entertain the appeal when they had been filed and when the Board acquired jurisdiction to entertain and dispose of those appeals only after the coming into force of the Validation Act of 1962. This was therefore a case of a transfer with retrospective effect of the jurisdiction of one authority in the matter of hearing second appeals to another authority. That being so, even if the Deputy Commissioner of Sales Tax had made no order for the return of the memoranda of appeal he would still have been required to transfer the appeals to the Board of Revenue for disposal after the coming into force of the Amendment Act. As, according to us, re -presentation of the memoranda of appeal before the Board of Revenue was not at an necessary, no question of any limitation in regard to their presentation to the Board of Revenue can arise. All the appeals filed by the petitioners before the Board of Revenue must therefore be regarded as filed within time.

(3.) FOR these reasons, this petition is allowed, the order dated 8 August 1961 of the Board of Revenue is quashed, and the Board is directed to dispose of according to law the appeals preferred by the petitioners against the orders of the Appellate Assistant Commissioner. In the circumstance of the case, we make no order for costs. The security deposit, shall be refunded to the petitioner.