Document Fragment View

Matching Fragments

20. The question to be determined in this case is whether this Court can issue direction to the Government of Tamil Nadu, to notify particular Statute.

21. The answer would be in negative, for the reasons hereinafter recorded.

22. This Court cannot give direction to the Government of Tamil Nadu to notify particular Statute, when Legislature has conditionally passed legislation, which is finally to be notified by the Government. The Court has no role to play in the Legislative function.

23. The Hon'ble Supreme Court, in A. K. Roy, etc. vs Union Of India and others, (1982) 1 SCC 271, by majority decision, was pleased to lay down as under:

50. We need not enter into the much debated question relating to the delegation of legislative powers. In The Queen v. Burah, the Privy Council upheld the delegated power to bring a law into force in a district and to apply to it, the whole or part of the present or future laws which were in force in other districts. In Russell v. The Queen it upheld the provision that certain parts of an Act should come into force only on the petition of a majority of electors. In Hodge v. The Queen, it upheld the power conferred upon a Board to create offences and annex penalties. The American authorities on the question of the validity of delegated powers need not detain us because, the theory that a legislature is a delegate of the people and therefore, it cannot delegate its power to another does not hold true under our Constitution. The executive, under our Constitution, is responsible to the legislature and is not independent of it as in the United States. The three Privy Council decisions to which we have referred above were considered by this Court in Re Delhi Laws Act case, which is considered as a leading authority on the question of delegated legislation. The Reference made in that case by the President under Article 143(1) of the Constitution to the Supreme Court, in regard to the validity of certain laws, was necessitated by the decision of the Federal Court in Jatindra Nath Gupta v. State of Bihar in which it was held by the majority that the power to extend the operation of an Act for a further period of one year with such modification as May be specified was a legislative power and that the provisions of section 1(3) of that Act which delegated that power to an outside agency was bad. One of the questions which was referred to this Court in Delhi Laws Act case was whether section 7 of the Delhi Laws Act, 1912 was ultra vires the Legislature which passed that Act. That section provided that the Provincial Government may by a notification extend with such restrictions and modifications as it thinks fit to the Province of Delhi or any part thereof any enactment which is in force in any part of British India at the date of such notification. The difficulty of discovering the ratio of the seven judgments delivered in the Delhi Laws Act case is well-known. There is, however, no difference amongst the learned Judges in their perception and understanding of what was actually decided in the three Privy Council cases to which we have referred and which were discussed by them. They read the Privy Council decisions as laying down that conditional legislation is permissible whereby the legislature entrusts to an outside agency the discretionary power to select the time or place to enforce the law. As stated by Shri H.M. Seervai in his "Constitutional Law of India" (2nd ed. at p. 1203: "The making of laws is not an end in itself, but is a means to an end, which the legislature desires to secure. That end may be secured directly by the law itself. But there are many subjects of legislation in which the end is better secured by extensive delegation of legislative power". There are practical difficulties in the enforcement of laws contemporaneously with their enactment as also in their uniform extension to different areas. Those difficulties cannot be foreseen at the time when the laws are made. It, therefore, becomes necessary to leave to the judgment of an outside agency the question as to when the law should be brought into force and to which areas it should be extended from time to time. What is permissible to the Legislature by way of conditional legislation cannot be considered impermissible to the Parliament when, in the exercise of its constituent power, it takes the view that the question as regards the time of enforcement of a Constitutional amendment should be left to the judgement of the executive. We are, therefore, of the opinion that section 1 (2) of the 44th Amendment Act is not ultra vires the power of amendment conferred upon the Parliament by Article 368 (1) of the Constitution.
54. As regards the argument that section 1(2) of the 44th Amendment Act is bad because it vests an uncontrolled power in the executive, we may point out, briefly, how similar and even more extensive delegation of powers to the executive has been upheld by this Court over the years. In Sardar Inder Singh v. State of Rajasthan, section 3 of the Rajasthan (Protection of Tenants) Ordinance provided that it shall remain in force for a period of two years unless that period is further extended by the Rajpramukh. It was held by this Court that section 3, in so far as it authorised the Rajpramukh to extend the life of the ordinance, fell within the category of conditional legislation and was ultra vires. The Court dissented from the view expressed in Jetindra Nath Gupta v. The State of Bihar, (supra) that the power to extend the life of an enactment cannot validly be conferred on an outside authority. In Sita Ram Bisaambhar Dayal and Ors. v. State of U.P. and others, section 3D (1) of the U.P. Sales Tax Act, 1948, which was challenged on the ground of excessive delegation, provided for levying taxes at such rates as may be prescribed by the State Government not exceeding the maximum prescribed. While rejecting the challenge, Hegde, J. speaking for the Court observed: (SCC p.487, para 5) "However much one might deplore the "New Despotism" of the executive, the very complexity of the modern society and the demand it makes on its Government have set in motion force which have made it absolutely necessary for the legislatures to entrust more and more powers to the executive. Text book doctrines evolved in the 19th Century have become out of date".

25. The reading of the Bill shows, that it is in nature of conditional legislation, as though the Statute has been enacted, but discretion is given to State to notify the date as to when it shall come into force. Once legislature in its wisdom has left it to the State Government to enforce the Act, by issuing notification, this Court cannot interfere with the legislative function to issue writ in the nature of Mandamus, as prayed for, in view of the settled position of law, as admittedly there are no allegations of malafide.