1985 (2) TMI 294

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....of various items set out in Schedule IV of the Calicut City Municipal Act, 190l subsequently restyled as Kerala Municipal Corporation Act, 1964 ( Corporation act' for short) including for use of premises and land for soaking coconut husks. The respondents are admittedly carrying on the trade of soaking coconut husks and they had not taken out a licence for carrying on the trade. The Commissioner of the appellant Corporation issued a notice to each of the respondents calling upon him to show cause why within three days of the receipt of the notice, the respondents should not be prosecuted for using premises for soaking coconut husks without obtaining a licence as required by law. The respondents challenged the validity and legality of th....

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....d these Appeals by special leave. Mr. A. S. Nambiar, learned counsel who appeared for the appellant-Corporation urged that the levy of licence fee as fee is fully justified and the High Court was In error in rejecting it as such on the ground that the respondents do not enjoy any special A service or benefit for paying the fees on the traditional view of law more or less than prevailing that for a fee there must necessarily be quid pro quo. He submitted that the trend revealed by recent decisions of this Court would show that traditional view about fee has undergone a sea change and that the demarcating line between tax and fee has become so blurred as to become almost invisible. It w-s alternatively submitted that even according to tradit....

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....rom the character of the fee. In fact, the special benefit or advantage to the payers of the fees may even be secondary as compared with the primary motive of regulation in the public interest. Nor is the court to assume the role of a cost accountant. It is neither necessary nor expedient to weigh too meticulously the coat of the services rendered etc. against the amount of fees collected so as to evenly balance the two. A broad co-relationship is all that is necessary quid pro quo in the strict sense is not the one and only true index of a fee; nor is it necessarily absent in a tax This view was reaffirmed in Sreenivasa General Traders and Others v. State of Andhra Pradesh and Others([1983] 4 S.C.C. 353.) observing that it is increasingly....