CUTTACK MUNICIPALITY Vs. SURENDRA NATH SAHU

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is a Letters Patent appeal from a decision of Mohamad Noor J., upholding concurrent decrees of the Courts below passed in favour of the plain, tiff- respondent. The plaintiff, respondent brought a suit against the Cuttack Municipality claiming a declaration that the Municipality were not entitled to charge an annual license fee in respect of druggists shops registered in the Municipality. The learned Munsif who heard the case came to the conclusion that the by-law upon which the Municipality relied was ultra vires the Bihar and Orissa Municipal Act, 1922, and he decreed the plaintiff's claim for the declaration.

(2.) On appeal the lower Appellate Court upheld this decision which was again affirmed in second appeal by Mohamad Noor J. The facts of the case can very shortly be stated as follows : The respondent is a medical practitioner who occupied certain premises which have been used as a druggist's shop for over twenty years. Some time after the Bihar and Orissa Municipal Act, 1922, came into force the Municipality, acting under the provisions of Section 291(j) of the Act, fixed a fee for the granting of a license to holders of druggist shops. Such a license is made necessary by reason of the provisions of Section 282 of that Act.

(3.) The fee fixed for the license appears to have been Rs. 20 and the by-law of the Municipality was confirmed by the Local Government as required by Section 354 of the Act on 1 June 1929. The Gazette of that date has this item: By-law framed by the Commissioners of the Cuttack Municipality under Section 291 (f) and (j) Bihar and Orissa Municipal Act. The fees for the grant of a license under Section 282 of the Bihar and Orissa Municipal Act shall be Rs. 20.