A.S. Mohammad Shereef and Co. and Others vs Assistant Collector of Customs and Others

S. Nainar Sundaram, Ag. C.J.

The ultimate point which the learned single Judge was called upon to concentrate in substance while dealing with the cases of the appellants

herein was, whether the dale of release for sale of the Gazette, containing the notification of withdrawal of exemption at New Delhi is the relevant

date to be taken into consideration for the enforceability of the notification or the date on which the Gazette notification was made known to the

public at various locale, wherever the traders are to be found. The learned single Judge opened that the date on which the Gazette containing the

Notification is released for sale at New Delhi is relevant. It is not as if the subject is a new one that has come up before this Court. In Asia

Tobacco Company Ltd. Vs. Union of India and Others, , one of us (Nainar Sundaram, J., as he then was) has expressed the view that the date

when the public gets notified in the sense, the concerned Gazette is made available to the public counts for notification. This pronouncement has

been confirmed by a Bench of this Court in Union of India Vs. Asia Tobacco Co. Ltd., ). The Bench also approved the proposition that the

normal method by which the public is made known is by asking (sic making?) the copy of the Gazette in which the Notification is printed, made

available for sale to the public. It is not tenable to insist that the Gazette, containing the notification, even though released and made available for

sale to the public at the place of release, must specifically reach the various locale, wherever the traders are to be found before the notification

came into effect. We cannot subscribe our support to such a theory.

Learned Counsel for the appellants made an attempt to say that the withdrawal of exemption was not in public interest, on the satisfaction of

which alone there could be a withdrawal of the exemption. Though such a plea has been taken in the affidavit not in an elaborate manner, and

countered in the counter-affidavit filed by the respondents, yet this plea was forgotten and was not at all urged before the learned single Judge so

as to covet a decision at his hands. We do not think that at the appellate stage, we should permit the appellants to argue this point. It was also

argued by the Learned Counsel for the appellants before us that in some of the cases the bills of entry were filed on the date of the release for sale

of the Gazette notification at New Delhi, namely, 6.10.1988, and hence in the absence of proof as to when exactly the Gazette notification was

released for sale on that day, the matter could be proceeded with as if the release took place only after the bills of entry were lodged. Such could

not be the presumption and it is the other way about. All official acts could be presumed to have been done at the earliest point of time of the day.

We do not find any merit in these writ appeals. Accordingly, they are dismissed.