1954 (3) TMI 33

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...., Senior Advocate, (B.K.P. Sinha, Advocate, with him), instructed by R.H. Dhebar, Agent. for the interveners. State of Madras: V.K.T. Chari, Advocate-General of Madras (V.V. Raghavan, Advocate, with him), instructed by R.H. Dhebar, Agent. for the interveners. M. Seshachalapathi, Advocate, instructed by R.H. Dhebar, Agent, for the respondent. K.V. Venkatasubramania Iyer, Senior Advocate, (A.N. Rangaswami and M.S.K. Aiyangar, Advocates, with him), for the appellant. The Judgment of the Court was delivered by DAS, J.- These two appeals arise out of W.P. Nos. 21 and 41 of 1952 filed in the High Court of Judicature at Madras under Article 226 questioning the validity of the Madras General Sales Tax Act (IX of 1939) and of the Turn....

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....in support of these appeals has not pressed the objection under item (b) but has insisted on the remaining grounds of objection. In our opinion the decisions of the High Court on those grounds are substantially well-founded and correct. On the question of legislative competency the learned Advocate drew our attention to entry 54 in List II of the Seventh Schedule to the Constitution of India and argued that this entry clearly indicated that entry 48 in List II of the Seventh Schedule to the Government of India Act, 1935, under which the impugned Act was passed, was much narrower in its scope and could not be read as authorising the making of a law with respect to taxes on the purchase of goods. This argument appears to us to be fallacious, ....

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....ssification for legislative purposes, provided that such classification is based on some differentia having a reasonable relation to the object and purposes of the law in question. As pointed out by the majority of the Bench which decided Chiranjitlal Chowdhury's case, [1950] S.C.R. 869., there is a strong presumption in favour of the validity of legislative classification and it is for those who challenge it as unconstitutional to allege and prove beyond all doubt that the legislation arbitrarily discriminates between different persons similarly circumstanced. There is no material on the record before us to suggest that the purchasers of other commodities are similarly situated as the purchasers of hides and skins. The majority decision in....