TaxTMI 
TaxTMI 
1986 (12) TMI 346
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.... Corporation of India. The petitioner is a company registered under the Companies Act and engaged in the production of atta, maida, suji, etc. In the year 1958, the Central Government issued an order known as Wheat (Regulation and Use in Roller Mills) Order, 1958. Under clause 4 of this Order, the roller mill was prohibited from purchasing any wheat from the open market. It could, under the Order, use the wheat which was allotted by the Government or the Government agency, Food Corporation of India. Since the roller flour mills were prohibited from purchasing the wheat from open market and the Food Corporation of India, according to the allegations of the roller mill, was not supplying the requisite quantity of wheat to the roller mills, a....
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....e ultra vires: "The Governor is further pleased to exempt, with immediate effect, subject to the conditions and restrictions specified in the said section, a roller flour mill holding a recognition certificate, from payment of tax on the purchase of wheat required by it for use as raw material in the manufacture of the said notified goods provided that such wheat is purchased from the Food Corporation of India." Although the petitioner had taken a number of other grounds but the point, abovementioned, was alone pressed before us. Having heard the petitioner's counsel as well as the counsel appearing for the State of U.P., we are unable to find any substance in the submission made. Section 3-D provides for the levy of purchase or sales tax....
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....n of purchase tax, if he purchases the same from the Food Corporation of India. In that event, everybody would be exempt from payment of tax. It is only those who do not make purchase from the Food Corporation of India that they are not entitled to the benefit of the notification. In that event, he will be liable to pay purchase tax. Counsel's argument that section 4-B provides for exemption for the purpose of giving incentive to new industries, it was not material as to from where wheat was purchased by them. True, it is that section 4-B was enacted for the purpose of conferring benefit on the new industries and payment of purchase tax or sales tax can be exempt partly or wholly or be payable at concessional rate in the case of new units,....
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....cted except by authority of law. Hence the levy of a tax can only be done by the authority of law and not by any executive order. Unless the executive is specifically empowered by law to give any exemption, it cannot say that it will not enforce the law as against a particular person. No court can give a direction to a Government to refrain from enforcing a provision of law. Under these circumstances, we must hold that the relief asked for by the appellant cannot be granted." From what was said by the Supreme Court in the aforesaid case, covers the controversy in the case before us in its entirety. The notification sought to be struck off by the petitioner confers exemption only on the purchases made from the Food Corporation of India. We ....
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.... J.N. Tiwari, learned counsel for the petitioner, appearing in this case and Sri R. A. Sharma, who is a counsel in Writ Petition No. 1042 of 1985, Shree Bhagwati Roller Flour Mills v. Sales Tax Officer (printed at page 117 infra) referred to a number of paragraphs from this decision and pointed out that the discretion of the State Government to issue a notification of exemption was not unfettered and that it had to be exercised according to law. The submission in so far as it goes cannot be questioned as erroneous. The power of granting exemption, which is discretionary, has to be exercised by taking into account the relevant considerations and not by irrelevant. The relevant consideration which was considered or taken into account by the S....