1988 (7) TMI 385

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....J.-Article 14 of the Constitution of India has been invoked by the petitioners-cinema owners and an association of cinema owners, operating in the State of Punjab, to challenge the insertion of sub-section (1-A) in section 3 of the Punjab Entertainment Duty Act, 1955 (for short "the Act") with effect from 1st April, 1986, annexure P. 1 to the petition. Section 3 of the Act is the charging secti....

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....tor of a smaller dimension, the television and its brother gadgets the V.C.R., the video cassette, etc., which have gone to provide entertainment publicly as also privately. This Court in Deep Snack Bar, Sonepat v. State of Haryana AIR 1984 P & H 377, while examining the question whether exhibition of motion pictures in a restaurant by means of V.C.Rs. and TX. sets falls within the definition o....

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....ared as such under the Punjab Municipal Act, 1911; and   (b) three thousand rupees per annum in areas other than the local areas specified II in clause (a) in respect of entertainments arranged by a proprietor by replay of video tape, a video cassette of a video record through the medium of any video tape player, video cassette player or video record player and the lump sum duty so levi....

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.... no distinction between an entertainment and an entertainment so as to attract different scales of entertainment duty. There is an obvious fallacy in the argument. Singular would include a plural; so it is understood in the jurisprudential sense. If two species of entertainment offered by two different methods, by two different means and magnitude, in different surroundings attract entertainment d....