GRASIM INDUSTRIES LTD Vs. ASSTT COLLECTOR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) BY this petition under Article 226 of the Constitution of India, the petitioner has prayed for quashing the notice Annexure-1 issued by the Assistant Collector, Central Excise, Ratlam to the petitioner to show cause why the excise duty amounting to Rs. 2,10,424. 50 should not be recovered from the petitioner as the petitioner had evaded payment of that duty.

(2.) THE material facts giving rise to this petition, briefly, are as follows:

(3.) HAVING heard learned Counsel for the petitioner, we have come to the conclusion that this petition deserves to be dismissed summarily. It was urged that the petitioner's factory at Nagda, where the goods in question were produced, would amount to a "workshop" and that the petitioner was entitled to exemption as provided by the notification Annexure-3. We refrain from expressing any opinion in that behalf because that is a question, which respondent No. 1 has yet to decide on the basis of the material, which would be brought on record by the petitioner in response to the show-cause notice. Instead of showing cause before respondent No. 1, who has issued the notice, the petitioner has approached this Court and sought stay of recovery proceedings. It is not disputed that if the decision of respondent No. 1, after hearing the petitioner, would be adverse to the petitioner, the petitioner has the remedy of appeal available to it under the Act. It was contended that as the question of interpretation of the notification Annexure-2 was involved, it was not obligatory for the petitioner to seek the statutory remedies available to it under the Act. It is true that the question as to whether on the facts and in the circumstances of the case, the petitioner is or is not entitled to claim exemption under the terms of the notification Annexure-2, will have to be ultimately decided. But that is a mixed question of law and fact and there is no satisfactory reason why the petitioner should not pursue the normal remedies available to it under Act. In this connection, we may usefully refer to the following observations of the Supreme Court in Assistant Collector of Central Excise, Chandan Nagar, West Bengal v. Dunlop India Limited and Ors. , AIR 1985 SC 330, 1985 (4) ECC 103 (SC), 1985 ECR4 (NULL), 1985 (19) ELT 22 (SC), [1985] 154 ITR 172 (SC), 1984 (2) SCALE 819, (1985) 1 SCC 260, [1985] 2 SCR 190, 1985 (17) UJ 368 (SC) :in Titaghur Paper Mills Co. Ltd. v. State of Orissa, AIR 1983 SC 603, [1983] 142 ITR 663 (SC), 1983 (1) SCALE 437, (1983) 2 SCC 433, [1983] 2 SCR 743, [1983] 53 STC 315 (SC) A. P. Sen, E. S. Venkataramiah and R. B. Mishra, JJ. , held that where the statute itself provided the petitioners with an efficacious alternative remedy by way of an appeal to the Prescribed Authority, a second appeal to the Tribunal and thereafter to have the case stated to the High Court, it was not for the High Court to exercise its extraordinary jurisdiction under Article 226 of the Constitution ignoring, as it were, the complete statutory machinery. That it has become necessary even now, for us to repeat this admonition is indeed a matter of tragic concern to us. Article 226 is not meant to short-circuit or circumvent statutory proceedings. It is only where statutory remedies are entirely ill-suited to meet the demands of extraordinary situations, as for instance, where the very vires of the statute is in question or where private or public wrongs are so inextricably mixed up and the prevention of public injury and the vindication of public justice require it that recourse may be had to Article 226 of the Constitution. But then the Court must have good and sufficient reasons to by-pass the alternative remedy provided by statute. Surely, matters involving the revenue where statutory remedies are available, are not such matters.