MUTHU BALU CHETTIAR Vs. CHAIRMAN, MADURA MUNICIPALITY

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The petitioners have been convicted by the Bench Magistrates of Madura for failing to take out a license under Section 249 of the Madras District Municipalities Act and have now put in a petition asking for a revision of that order. The offence of which the petitioners have been convicted is that of failing to take out an annual license for the rice mills owned and worked by them on the ground that a rice mill is a place used for the purposes specified in Schedule V, Clause (q) of the Act, namely, "using for any industrial purposes any fuel or machinery or doing in the course of any industrial process anything which is likely to be dangerous to human life or health or property". The contention for the petitioners is that when a permission to construct or establish a factory or instal in any premises any machinery, etc., has been obtained under Section 250 of the Act, no annual license under Section 249 need be obtained as the two sections are mutually exclusive. This is the view taken by a Division Bench of this Court (Devadoss and Waller, JJ.) in Madura Municipality V/s. Muthu Baku Chetti (1926) 50 MLJ 384, whereas the contrary view was taken in In re Muthu Balu Chetti (1926) 51 MLJ 490 by Odgers and Madhavan Nair, JJ. These petitions have therefore been placed before this Bench for a decision on the question. Waller, J., was of opinion that a distinction is drawn in the Act between industries and factories, the former being dealt with in Section 249 and the latter in Section 250, and based this view to a great extent upon the supposed anomaly that the contrary view would mean that when a Municipal Council had granted permission for the erection of a factory under Section 250 it would be open to the Chairman to refuse a license for its subsequent working. The anomaly is more apparent than real, for the Chairman's decisions under Section 249 are subject to an appeal to the Council.

(2.) When the sections are closely examined, it is apparent that Section 249 is much wider than Section 250; for, it purports to deal with any place which is used for any one or more of the purposes specified in Schedule V and the word "place" certainly includes a factory or workshop, for Schedule V undoubtedly includes some factories. The word place therefore must be taken to include not only a factory, workshop, or work place as mentioned in Section 250, Clause 1(a) but any other place used for the purposes mentioned in Schedule V. Section 250 clearly applies only to factories, workshops or work-places in which it is proposed to employ steam-power, water-power or other mechanical-power or electrical-power, or places in which any machinery or manufacturing plant driven by steam, water or other power is installed. The places referred to in Section 250 are those of a more important character, and before any person can construct or establish any such factory he is bound to get the permission of the Council to do so. That permission is given solely for the construction, establishment or installation, as is also apparent from Clause 5 of the section which says that the provisions of Section 197 dealing with new buildings shall not be deemed to be dispensed with. Section 250 does not deal with the user of such places but only with their inception. When the owner wishes to use them, and they are such as come within Schedule V, Clause (q), Section 249 becomes applicable and the owner must take out an annual license from the chairman of the Council. This is the view that was taken by Odgers and Madhavan Nair, JJ., and we think that this is certainly the correct view.

(3.) The question of whether a rice mill is likely to be dangerous to human life or health or property within the meaning of Schedule V, Clause (q), does not arise in these cases, for it has been found as a fact that the rice mills in question are dangerous to human life and health. It is consequently unnecessary to go into the further question of whether the words in that clause "which is likely to be dangerous to human life or health" govern the words "any fuel or machinery" or not.