TaxTMI 
TaxTMI 
1961 (4) TMI 143
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....ants to come to this Court in appeal, and so it is with the said certificates that the two appeals have been brought to this Court. 2. It is not necessary to set out the material facts leading to the two writ petitions in any detail. It would be enough to say that under s. 5 of the impugned Act notices had been served on both the appellants by the respondent Deputy Commissioner and Collector of Kamrup calling upon them to submit a return giving the particulars of all their lands in the prescribed form and stating therein their selection of plot or plots of land (not exceeding in the aggregate the limits fixed under s. 4) which they desired to retain under the provisions of the Act. The appellants contended before the High Court that the impugned Act under which this notice had been served on them was invalid and ultra vires and so they wanted the notice issued under s. 5 to be quashed. That is the only relevant fact which needs to be stated for deciding the present appeals. 3. The Act received the assent of the President on December 7, 1956, and was published in the official State Gazette on January 16, 1957. Subsequently it was amended by the amending Act XVII of 1957 and assent....
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....ould be, liable to pay rent for that land to the other person, and includes a person who cultivates the land of another person on condition of delivering a share of the produce. These are the only definitions which are relevant for our purpose. 5. Section 4 which is the key section of the Act prescribes ceiling on existing holding. The limit prescribed is 150 bighas in the aggregate subject to its provisos. Section 5 empowers the appropriate authorities to call for submission of returns by persons holding lands in excess of the ceiling. Section 8 empowers the State Government to acquire such excess lands by publishing in the official gazette a notification to the effect that such lands are required for public purpose, and such publication shall be conclusive evidence of the notice of acquisition to the person or persons holding such lands. Acquisition of excess lands prescribed by s. 8 is followed by the vesting of the said lands in the State under s. 9. On publication of the notification under s. 8 all such excess lands shall stand transferred to the State Government from the date of the publication of the said notification free from encumbrances by their original owner or owners....
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.... several occasions in dealing with legislative measures of agrarian reforms. The object of such reforms generally is to abolish the intermediaries between the State and the cultivator and to help the actual cultivator by giving him the status of direct relationship between himself and the State. Article 31A(1)(a) provides that, notwithstanding anything contained in Art. 13, no law providing for the acquisition by the State of any estate or of any rights therein or the extinguishment or modification of any such rights, shall be deemed to be void on the ground that it is inconsistent with or takes away or abridges any of the rights conferred by Art. 14, Art. 19 or Art. 31, provided that, where such law is a law made by the Legislature of a State, the provisions of this Article shall not apply thereto unless such law, having been reserved for the consideration of the President, has received this assent. We have already seen that the assent of the President has been obtained both for the Act as it was originally passed and for the amending Act which subsequently modified some of the provisions of the original Act, and so the requirement prescribed by the proviso to Art. 31A(1)(a) is s....
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.... down as such. His argument is that though ostensibly it purports to be a measure of agrarian reform its principal object and indeed its pith and substance is to acquire the property covered by its provisions and make profit by disposing of the same in the manner provided by Chapter III. Mr. Chatterjee seemed to suggest that the Legislature should not have made it necessary for the tenants to exercise an option for taking settlement under s. 16 because the exercise of the said option involves the liability to pay the prescribed amount though in five installments, and that, according to Mr. Chatterjee, indicates that the State wanted to make profit out of the bargain. Mr. Chatterjee's grievance is against the provisions of s. 18 also under which a tenant who does not opt for settlement is liable to be evicted. We are not impressed by this argument. The doctrine of colourable legislation really postulates that legislation attempts to do indirectly what it cannot do directly. In other words, though the letter of the law is within the limits of the powers of the Legislature, in substance the law has transgressed those powers and by doing so it has taken the precaution of concealin....