Attached Plant Requirement Controls Bamboo Pulp Exemption; External Purchases Do Not Defeat Relief

An exemption under Notification No. 45/73-C.E. depended on the factory having an attached plant for making bamboo pulp; where no such plant existed, the benefit could not be denied merely because bamboo pulp was purchased and used from outside. The plain wording of the proviso controlled, and the interpretation that added words or relied on assumed legislative intent was rejected. The factory was therefore entitled to the exemption, and the contrary denial could not stand.

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Issues: Whether the benefit of Notification No. 45/73-C.E. dated 01-03-1973 could be denied to a factory that did not have any plant attached thereto for making bamboo pulp, on the ground that it purchased and used bamboo pulp from outside.

Analysis: The proviso to the notification was clear and turned on the existence of a plant attached to the factory for making bamboo pulp. The admitted position was that the factory had no such attached plant. The broader construction adopted by the Collector, treating external use of bamboo pulp as enough to deny the exemption, was rejected because it added words to the proviso and displaced its plain language. The benefit of an exemption notification could not be withheld by substituting supposed intention for the express wording used.

Conclusion: The petitioner was entitled to the benefit of the notification and the denial of exemption was ; the order of the Collector was liable to be set aside.

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