BLACK DIAMOND INDUSTRIES Vs. COAL CONTROLLERS

JUDGEMENT

(1.) All these seven writ applications have been filed by the owners of the hard coke plants who manufacture hard coke. They have challenged the validity of Bihar Trade Articles (Licences Unification) Order, 1984 (hereinafter called the Unification Order), the amendments made in Schedule III of Unification Order by GSR 47, dated 17th October, 1985 reviving certain clauses of Bihar Coal Control Order, 1956, (Coal Control Order for brevity) and Bihar Essential Articles (Display of prices and Stock) Order, 1977 (Display Order for brevity). In the alternative, they have challenged the applicability of those three Bihar Orders to them as producers and dealers of hard coke and to the hard coke plants where hard coke is produced. The facts in all these cases are similar and the law applicable thereto being the same, they were heard together and are being disposed of by this judgement.

(2.) The petitioners are owners of hard coke oven/plants and carry on business of production and sale of hard coke. The hard coke ovens are registered under the Factories Act, 1948. the coke ovens/plants of the petitioners produce hard coke which is known as beehive hard coke. According to the petitioners the Colliery Control Order, 1945 shall apply to them and to their coke ovens/plants. It is their case that although they are dealers in coal within the meaning of the Unification Order, Display Order and Coal Control Order, but as their plants are 'Colliery' and they are colliery owners within the meaning of Colliery Control Order read with the Mines Act, 1952, that Order is applicable to them and not the Bihar Orders. As the Colliery Control Order specifically deals with producers of and plants for producing coke, that Order only shall apply. They also contend that the Display Order, the Unification Order and the Coal Control Order encroached on the field already covered by the Colliery Control Order; therefore, those orders must be held to be void to the extent it encroached on covered field. Further, the Display Order is invalid as it was issued without the previous concurrence of the Central Government. So far Coal Control Order is concerned, the petitioners also contend that the Order was repealed by Cl.32 of the Unification Order in 1984 and by amending the Unification Order in 1985 by passing another Order some clauses of Coal Control Order could not be revived. No counter affidavit has been filed either by the Union of India and its various departments or the State of Bihar and its various departments. Counter-affidavit has been filed in C.W.J.C. No. 550/85(R) on behalf of respondent No. 2, the Deputy Commissioner of Dhanbad and respondent Nos. 7 to 11, different officers of the State Government in the district of Dhanbad. In the counter affidavit it has been stated that the Colliery Control Order and the Unification Order operate in two different fields and there is no conflict between the two. Both the orders are applicable to the petitioners. So far as the Display Order and Coal Control Order are concerned, the counter-affidavit is silent. There is no dispute, therefore, that Colliery Control Order is applicable to the petitioners.

(3.) The short question that arises in these cases is; do Unification Order, Display Order and Coal Control Order also apply to petitioners who are admittedly governed by Colliery Control Order ? Other questions were also raised by the petitioners. But if the question formulated is answered by holding that the three Bihar Orders do not apply, it will not be necessary to decide other questions.