JASH KARAN RATHI Vs. STATE OF WEST BENGAL

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This revisional application under Article 227 of the Constitution of India read with Section 482, Cr. P..C. has been filed by Jash Karan Rathi against the State of West Bengal challenging the order dated 7-9-92 passed by the Collector, E. C. Act, Jalpaiguri in E. C. Case No. 8/26 of 92-93 arising out of Dhubguri P. S. Case No. 51/92 dated 7-8-92 as erroneous and illegal. By this order learned Collector, E.C. Act confiscated the seized articles namely, 48.50 quintals of Pulses and directed their sale and deposit of the sale-proceed to the Government treasury. The relevant facts leading to the filing of this application may be summarised as follows :-- A raid was held at the grocery shop of the applicant at Dhubguri bazar by the Dhubguri Police in the absence of the applicant and as the son of the applicant failed to produce the books of account to the Officers on their demand, they seized 29 tins of mustard oils, 59 bags of Pulses of different variety and also sugar and spices along with a stock-cum-rate board, Trade licence and Food licence. The seized pulses belonged to four owners besides the applicant and the applicant share therein was to the extent of 9.9 quintals only. Accordingly, all the five owners made applications before the Collector for release of their respective Pulses, but the learned Collector without taking any evidence and without assigning any reason rejected their petitions and confiscated the entire quantity of Pulses while returning the other seized articles in favour of the petitioner. The order of the learned Collector suffers from several infirmities. First, in his order there is no finding that there had been any violation on the part of the petitioners in respect of any order made under Section 3 of the Essential Commodities Act and hence the order is wholly without jurisdiction. Secondly, the learned Collector did not assign any reason as to why he was not accepting or allowing the petitions of four other persons taking the plea that they had kept their Pulses in the godown of the applicant for the reason that their houses were near the same. Thirdly, the learned Collector passed the impugned order without caring to take any evidence to ascertain the truth or falsity of the averments in the petitions of the five petitioners. Hence this revisional application has been filed for an order quashing the impugned order and returning the seized commodity in favour of the owners.

(2.) The petition has been contested by the State of West Bengal. Mr. Ghosh, the learned Advocate for the State contends that the impugned order has been passed under Section 6A of the E.C. Act. Under the provisions of Section 6C if any person is aggrieved by any order of the Collector passed under Section 6A, his remedy lies in preferring an appeal before the appropriate authority as appointed by the State Govt. But, since instead of availing himself of this alternative remedy by preferring an appeal before such an appellate authority from the order of the Collector in question the petitioner has straightway moved this Court by filing this revisional application, this must be taken to be mala fide attempt on his part of circumvent the provisions of law and on that score alone this revisional application should be dismissed holding it to be not maintainable. Because, according to him, an application like this can be filed only when there is no other alternative remedy available to the applicant under the law.

(3.) As against this, the contention of Mr. De, learned Counsel for the petitioners, is that the question of his availing of any such alternative remedy cannot arise in this case in view of the reason that the impugned order suffers from a basic defect, namely lack of jurisdiction on the part of the Collector, inasmuch as, the learned Collector has failed to record his prima facie satisfaction therein that the person concerned had violated any order made under Section 3 of the E.C. Act. In support on his argument Mr. De has referred to a decision of a single Bench of this Court reported in (1983) 87 CWN 534 (Raj Kumar Mondal v. State of W. B.). In this decision it has been held that though the general Rule is that the High Court will not ordinarily interfere under Article 227 of the Constitution where the petitioner has an alternative remedy, equally speedy and efficacious, but he has not availed of it, yet this rule of alternative remedy will not oust the jurisdiction of the High Court to interfere in special circumstances or in extraordinary cases where the order of administrative authority under challenge is on the face of it without jurisdiction and the aggrieved person has no speedy remedy except by moving this Court under Article 227 of the Constitution and the case before His Lordship wherein the impugned order of the Collector suffered from the vice of lack of jurisdiction due to non-mentioning of the satisfaction regarding violation of any order under Section 3 of the E.C. Act was found to fall in the category of cases where the interference by this Court under Article 227 of the Constitution was called for.