JUDGMENT B.S. Chauhan, J.
1. This writ petition has been filed for quashing the demand notice dated 22.03.2006 for recovery of Rs. 2,54,686/- as outstanding dues towards electricity consumption.
2. The facts and circumstances giving rise to this case are that on 15.02.2006, in a surprise check by respondent Department, the petitioner was found committing theft of electricity. He was proceeded with under the provisions of the Electricity Act, 2003 (hereinafter called the 'Act'). However the offence was compounded under Sub-section (3) of Section 152 of the Act, asking the petitioner to deposit a sum of Rs. 50,000/-. Petitioner deposited the said amount but he received the impugned recovery notice dated 22.03.2006 for a sum of Rs. 2,54,686/-. Hence the present petition.
3. Shri Mayank Agrawal, learned Counsel for the petitioner has submitted that once the matter has been compounded and the petitioner has deposited the entire amount, no recovery is permissible. Therefore, the notice impugned is liable to be quashed,
4. On the other hand, Ms. Suman Sirohi, learned Standing Counsel appearing for respondents No. 3 and 4 and Shri W.H. Khan, learned Counsel appearing for the respondent Corporation have submitted that the compounding fee was recovered as a penalty for committing the theft and the deposit of the said amount does not exonerate the petitioner from civil liability, i.e. from making payment of the outstanding dues of electricity consumed by him. The petition is liable to be dismissed. More so, if the petitioner has any grievance regarding the quantum of the amount, the only remedy available to him is to approach the Authority under the provisions of the U.P. Electricity Supply Code, 2005 but the writ petition is not maintainable.
5. In view of the submissions made by the learned Counsel for the respondents, Shri Mayank Agrawal, learned Counsel for the petitioner prays for withdrawal of the writ petition. His prayer is accepted and the writ petition is dismissed as withdrawn.
6. At this stage, Shri Mayank Agrawal, learned Counsel for the petitioner has submitted that the recovery is likely to be made in pursuance of the impugned notice dated 22.03.2006 but it may take sometime to approach the Authority under the Code 2005 for obtaining appropriate order, and so this Court should grant stay of recovery of the amount for a stipulated period and during that period, the petitioner shall get an appropriate order from the Authority under the Code 2005.
7. The issue involved herein is as to whether this Court has a power to grant the relief sought at this stage to the petitioner when the petition has been dismissed as withdrawn and the matter has neither been adjudicated upon on merit nor examined at all.
8. The issue involved herein was examined by a Constitution Bench of the Hon'ble Apex Court in The State of Orissa v. Madan Gopal Rungta , wherein the Orissa High Court while dismissing the writ petition without entering into the merit of the case, relegated the petitioner therein to the Civil Court as the petition raised disputed questions of fact, had granted the interim relief for a limited period to facilitate the petitioner to approach the Civil Court and obtain the interim relief. The Hon'ble Apex Court set aside the said order of the High Court observing that the writ was not maintainable only for the purpose of granting interim relief and in case the High Court did not entertain the case on merit and relegated the party to some other forum, it did not have a power to grant interim relief for the interregnum period. The Court held as under:
The question which we have to determine is whether directions in the nature of interim relief only could be granted under Article 226, when the Court expressly stated that it refrained from determining the rights of the parties on which a writ of mandamus or directions of a like nature could be issued. In our opinion, Article 226 cannot be used for the purpose of giving interim relief as the only and final relief on the application as the High Court has purported to do. The directions have been given here only to circumvent the provisions of Section 80 Civil P.C., and in our opinion that it is not within the scope of Article 226. An interim relief can be granted only in aid of and as ancillary to the main relief which may be available to the party on final determination of his rights in a suit or proceeding. If the Court was of opinion that there was no other convenient or adequate remedy open to the petitioners, it might have proceeded to investigate the case on its merits and come to a decision as to whether the petitioners succeeded in establishing that there was an infringement of any of their legal rights which entitled them to a writ of mandamus or any other directions of a like nature; and pending such determination it might have made a suitable interim order for maintaining the status quo ante. But when the Court declined to decide on the rights of the parties and expressly held that they should be investigated more properly in a civil suit, it could not, for the purpose of facilitating the institution of such suit, issue directions in the nature of temporary injunctions, under Article 226 of the Constitution. In our opinion, the language of Article 226 does not permit such an action. On that short ground, the judgment of the Orissa High Court under appeal cannot be upheld.
9. The said judgment stood approved by a Seven Judges' Bench of the Hon'ble Apex Court in Special Reference No. 1 of 1964 under Article 143 of the Constitution of India, , further placing reliance on Maxwel wherein it had been observed that when an Act confers a jurisdiction, it impliedly also grants the power of doing of such acts or applying such means as are essentially necessary to its execution.
10. The ratio of the said judgment in Madan Gopal (supra) has consistently been approved and followed by the Hon'ble Apex Court as is evident from the Constitution Benches decisions in Amarsarjit Singh v. State of Punjab ; and State of Orissa v. Ram Chandra Dev .
11. In State of Bihar v. Rambalak Singh "Balak" and Ors. , the Hon'ble Apex Court has made a similar observation observing that granting interim relief is permissible when the case is pending before the Court and if jurisdiction is conferred by the Statute upon a Court, the conferment of jurisdiction implies the conferment of power of doing all such acts or applying such means.
12. In The Premier Automobiles Ltd. v. Kamlakar Shantaram Wadke and Ors. , a similar view has been reiterated.
13. Thus, it is evident from the aforesaid judgments of the Hon'ble Apex Court that the Court has a power to grant interim relief so long the case is pending before it. In a case where the writ Court refuses to entertain a petition and relegates the party to some other appropriate forum or the party itself withdraws the writ petition to approach another forum, as the case does not remain pending before the Court, the writ Court has no competence to issue any direction protecting the right of the petitioner interregnum, for the reason that writ does not lie for granting only an interim relief and interim relief can be granted provided the case is pending before the Court and rights of the parties are likely to be adjudicated upon on merit.
14. A Constitution Bench of the Hon'ble Apex Court in Maharaj Umeg Singh and Ors. v. State of Bombay and Ors. , entertained a writ petition under Article 32 of the Constitution of India and the question involved therein had been as to whether the Moti Moree held by the petitioner and his ancestors under a Grant was part of Jagir within the meaning of The Bombay Merged Territories and Areas (Jagir Abolition) Act, 1954. The vires of the provisions of the Act had been challenged. The Hon'ble Apex Court subsequently came to the conclusion that the petitioner therein had to establish satisfactorily that the Moti Moree was not a Jagir within the definition given under the Act 1954 and the question required to be completely thrashed out and adjudicated upon by the Civil Court. The Court relegated the parties to the Civil Court and adjourned the case till that issue was decided by the Civil Court. However, the Court further granted the following interim relief:
We, therefore, order that the petitioner do file the necessary Suit within three months on this date and the petition do stand adjourned till after the hearing and final disposal of that Suit. The stay granted by this Court in this petition will continue in the meanwhile. We may record here that the learned Advocate General on behalf of State of Bombay has also given his undertaking not to take any steps against the petitioner in the meanwhile.
15. In the said case, though the parties therein were relegated to the Civil Court for adjudication of their rights by adducing evidence on facts but granted the interim relief till the disposal of the Suit for the reason that the matter remained pending before the Court to be decided after disposal of the Suit. More so, it contained an undertaking given by the Advocate General of the State of Bombay not to take any step adversely affecting the petitioner.
16. Even if it is assumed for the sake of argument that in Maharaj Umeg Singh (supra) the Hon'ble Apex Court has expressed the contrary opinion, the said judgment does not have any binding effect for the reason that the issue involved herein was not involved therein. On the other hand, in Madan Gopal Rungta (supra), exactly a similar issue was involved and had been replied.
17. More so, the order passed in Maharaja Umeg Singh (supra) can be held to be an order passed under Article 142 of the Constitution of India in the facts and circumstances of the case to do complete justice between the parties.
18. It is settled proposition of law that an issue, which has not been considered by the Court while delivering a judgment, cannot be said to be binding as a decision of the Court takes its colour from the questions involved in the case in which it is rendered and while applying the decision to a later case, the Court must carefully try to ascertain the true principle laid down by the decision of the Court. The Court should not place reliance upon a discussion without discussing as to how the factual situation fits in with a fact situation of the decision on which reliance is placed, as it has to be ascertained by analyzing all the material facts and the issues involved in the case and argued on both sides. The judgment has to be read with reference to and in context with a particular statutory provisions interpreted by the Court as the Court has to examine as what principle of law has been decided and the decision cannot be relied upon in support of a proposition that it did not decide (Vide H.H. Maharajadhiraja Madhav Rao Jivaji Rao Scindia Bahadur and Ors. v. Union of India ; Amar Nath Om Prakash and Ors. v. State of Punjab and Ors. ; Rajpur Rude Meha v. State of Gujarat ; C.I.T. v. Sun Engineering Works (P) Ltd. ; Sarva Shramik Sangh, Bombay v. Indian Hume Pipe Co. Ltd. and Anr. ; Haryana Financial Corporation and Anr. v. Jagdamba Oil Mills and Anr. ; Mehboob Dawood Shaikh v. State of Maharastra ; Makhija Construction and Enggr. Pvt Ltd. v. Indore Development Authority and Ors. ; and Shin-Etsu Chemical Co. Ltd. v. Aksh Optifibre Ltd. (2005) 7 SCC 23).
19. In Jawahal Lal Sazawal and Ors. v. State of Jammu & Kashmir and Ors. , Hon'ble Supreme Court held that a judgment may not be followed in a given case if it has some distinguishing features.
20. In Bhavnagar University v. Palitana Sugar Mill (P) Ltd. , the Hon'ble Supreme Court held that a decision is an authority for which it is decided and not what can logically be deduced therefrom. A little difference in facts or additional facts may make a lot of difference in the precedential value of a decision. While deciding the said case the Court placed reliance upon its earlier judgment in Delhi Administration v. Manohar Lal .
21. In Union of India v. Chajju Ram , a Constitution Bench of the Hon'ble Supreme Court held as under:
It is now well settled that a decision is an authority for what it decides and not what can logically be deduced therefrom. It is equally well settled that a little difference in facts may lead to a different conclusion.
22. In Ashwani Kumar Singh v. U.P. Public Service Commission and Ors. , the Apex court held that a judgment of the Court is not to be read as a statute as it is to be remembered that judicial utterances have been made in setting of the facts of a particular case. Substantial flexibility; one additional or different fact may make a world of difference between the conclusions in two cases. Disposal of cases by blindly placing reliance upon a decision is not proper.
23. There is another possibility that after obtaining an interim relief from the Court, the party may not approach any other forum and cause prejudice to the rights of the other parties.
24. Thus, in view of the above, the relief sought by the petitioner at this stage after withdrawing the writ petition cannot be granted and prayer so made stands rejected.