BIHAR SUGAR MILLS ASSOCIATION Vs. UNION OF INDIA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) There are nine petitioners in C.W.J.C. No. 7582 of 2004. Petitioner No. 1 is the Association of Sugar Mills of which petitioners 2 to 9, the eight individual sugar mills, are members. C.W.J.C. No. 8088 of 2004 is filed at the instance of a single sugar mill. All the petitioners in the two writ petitions seek to challenge the rate of transport rebate and the conditions attached for availing the rebate as fixed by the Central Government vide Order No. GSR 203 (E)/Ess.Com/Sugarcane published in the Gazette of India, Extraordinary, dated March 22, 2004 (A copy of the Gazette notification is at Annexure-1 to C.W.J.C. No. 7582 of 2004). The impugned order allowed the sugar mills in Bihar (as well as in three other States) to deduct from the price paid for the sugarcane, transport rebate @ 28 paise per quintal per kilometre, subject to a maximum of Rs. 5.83 per quintal. However, a proviso to the order added the condition that the rebate would be allowed only to those sugar mills that made timely payments of cane price and cleared all arrears of cane payment dues, together with due interest as per clause 3 of the Sugarcane (Control) Order, 1966.

(2.) The petitioners make the grievance that the transport rebate is fixed at a rate that is too low and inadequate and the conditions attached for availing it is quite illegal, restrictive and unreasonable.

(3.) In order to examine the petitioners' claim in its proper perspective it would be necessary to refer to certain provisions of the Sugarcane (Control) Order, 1966 (made under Section 3 of the Essential Commodities Act, 1955 (Act 10 of 1955) and the Bihar Sugarcane (Regulation of Supply and Purchase) Act, 1981 and the Rules framed thereunder along with some recent amendments introduced in some of those provisions as a result of the direction(s) given by the Court when the petitioners earlier came before it. Clause 3 of the Sugar Control Order, 1966 (hereinafter referred to as the Central Order) empowers the Central Government to fix the minimum price of Sugarcane to be paid by producer of sugar. The clause, in so far as relevant for the present, is reproduced below :