PARTAP SINGH KADIAN Vs. STATE OF PUNJAB

JUDGEMENT

(1.) A multi-pronged attack against the validity and the constitutionality of the Punjab Wheat (Restriction of Stock by Producers) Order 1974 has been forcefully levelled in this writ petition. It arises from facts which are not in serious dispute but to which detailed reference is nevertheless necessary.

(2.) PARTAP Singh Kadian, petitioner, claims to be what may compendiously be termed as a progressive farmer of the State of Punjab. He is a Graduate in Agriculture and has adopted farming as his profession and carries on mechanical cultivation of an area of 27 acres of land situated in village Kadian, Tahsil and district Ludhiana. He has been a former member of the Punjab Legislative Assembly and is now the General Secretary of the Punjab Khetibari Zamindari Union which claims to have a membership of more than seventy-five thousand farmers. The writ petition is therefore, claimed to be more or less of a representative character on behalf of the producers.

(3.) THE admitted background of the impugned statutory order is that in early 1973 in pursuance of a policy decision the Central Government decided to take over completely the trading in wheat. To give effect to that policy this State promulgated the Punjab Wheat Dealers' Licensing and Price Control Order on the 3rd of April, 1973. However, in the actual execution of that policy within the State of Punjab and also at the All India level serious difficulties were experienced and in certain areas a total failure of the procurement of wheat resulted therefrom. As a result thereof in the ensuing year, 1974, a reversal or substantial modification of the wheat trade take over was made by the Central Government and as a result of the larger policy decision the State of Punjab on the 18th of April, 1974, promulgated the Punjab Wheat Dealers Licensing and Price Control (First Amendment) Order, 1974, and simultaneously therewith the Wheat Procurement (Levy) Order, 1974, was also enforced. Thereby very substantial changes in the procurement policy were envisaged and in particular wholesale dealers in wheat were again brought back into the field of procurement primarily on the condition that 50 per cent of the wheat purchased by them would be surrendered to the State Government in the form of a levy at the rate of Rupees 105.00 per quintal and the remaining 50 per cent would be allowed to be disposed of in the open market or by the issue of export permits from the State.