STATE OF BIHAR Vs. INDERCHAND JAIN

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This appeal is directed against the judgment and decree of a Subordinate Judge of Hazaribagh, setting aside those of a Munsif of the same station and decreeing the suit instituted by the respondents, who own industrial concerns, against the appellants.

(2.) The facts giving rise to this appeal are these -- The State of Bihar started the supply of electricity to the consumers of Hazaribagh town six or seven years before the institution of the suit, and defendant-appellant No. 2, who was the Assistant Electrical Engineer, was in charge of this work on behalf of the State. Since then, the plaintiffs respondents took electric connections and have been receiving electrical energy for industrial purposes. On the 30th April, 1956, there was a notification by the State Government, in which they increased the rates for supply of electrical energy. This Notification was published in the Bihar Gazette dated 8-8-1956. By this notification the rate for minimum consumption at 1000 units per K W. per annum to be charged for electrical energy supplied for industrial purposes was introduced. On the basis of this notification, the Assistant Electrical Engineer demanded in April, 1957 from the plaintiffs, for the year 1956-57 the difference between the charges for the electrical energy actually consumed by them and the charges they were liable to pay for the minimum fixed by the notification. The plaintiffs protested against this demand. Again, in May, 1958 the Assistant Electrical Engineer issued an annual supplementary bill for the electrical energy consumed by the plaintiff? respondents, demanding the amount corresponding to the difference in the rates on account of the units actually consumed and the units required by the rate for minimum consumption.

(3.) The case of the plaintiffs respondents was that the State Government could not in law fix a minimum quantity of consumption of electrical energy in supersession of the contract previously entered into between the plaintiffs and the defendants and that the charges in the bills for the supposed quantity of electrical energy consumed in excess of the actual quantity consumed were illegal. The defendants appellants, who filed written statements to the same effect, however, justified the charges, in pursuance of the notifications issued in 1956 and 1958. As stated earlier, the learned Additional Munsif, Hazaribagh accepted the contentions of the appellants, but the learned Subordinate Judge rejected the same and decreed the suit.