SK KAMIRUDDIN Vs. UNION OF INDIA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Whether Section 29 of the State Financial Corporations Act, 1951 (for short, "the Act") is in the nature of a 'Henry VIII Clause', as contended by the petitioners, or discharges the function of a 'catalyst in the process of industrialisation', as is the case of the opposite parties, is the question needing our determination in this batch of petitions which have been taken up at the first instance for deciding the vires of the Section.

(2.) The attack on vires is mounted on the anvil of Article 14 of the Constitution. To put the arguments in a nutshell, the same is that Sections 29 and 31 (or for that matter, Section 32-GJ) of the Act operate in the same field and the former being harsher than the latter and there being no guidance as to which provision should be invoked in which case, Section 29 has conferred arbitrary power on the Corporations and is, therefore, violative of Article 14 of the Constitution. To answer this, we have to see the following:-

(3.) Before undertaking the long journey, we may remind ourselves that there is a presumption of constitutionality of a provision. This apart, it has been contended by Shri Mohanty, one of the learned counsel for the opposite parties, that when violation of Article 14 is urged, it is the burden of the person challenging the vires to establish the same. As to the argument relating to burden, we would only say that the stand taken by Shri Mohanty may not be correct in view of what has been stated by the Constitution Bench in paragraph 16 of D. S. Nakara v. Union of India, AIR 1983 SC 130 : (1983 Lab IC 1), in which, while seized with the question whether the classification made by the memorandum in question was hit by Article 14, the Bench stated that the State has to establish not only the rational principle on which classification is founded, but that it is co-related to the object sought to be achieved. This was also said to be the approach adopted in Ramana Dayaram v. International Airport Authority of India, AIR 1979 SC 1628. We may not, however, pursue this question of burden as both the sides having laid down their cards fully, the question of burden is not relevant for the cases at hand.