Court No. - 29
Case :- WRIT - C No. - 18918 of 2019 Petitioner :- M/S Swarup Rolling Mills Limited And Another Respondent :- State Of U.P. And 2 Others Counsel for Petitioner :- Mayank Kumar Agrawal Counsel for Respondent :- C.S.C.,Awadhesh Kumar Saxena
Hon'ble Pankaj Mithal,J. Hon'ble Prakash Padia,J.
Heard Sri Mayank Kumar Agrawal, learned counsel for the petitioners, learned Standing counsel for respondents nos. 1 and 3 and Sri A.K. Saxena, learned counsel for respondent no. 2.
Under the U.P. Industrial and Service Sector Investment Policy, 2004 a new industry set up after the enforcement of the said policy was entitled to exemption of duty or electricity for a period of 10 years. The notification with regard to exemption was issued by the State Government on 21.1.2010. A dispute arose as to the date from which the exemption would be granted ie., either from the date of the commencement of the policy or from the issuance of the notification. The matter travelled upto the Supreme Court and it was decided that the exemption from the electricity duty would be admissible to all eligible industries set-up after the enforcement of the above policy for a period of 10 years from the date of the notification ie. 21.1.2010 till 21.1.2020.
The petitioner no. 1 is an industry which was set-up after the enforcement of the above policy and has been granted the eligibility certificate from the exemption of electricity duty. However, pending the above duty the petitioner continued to pay the electricity duty for the period 21.1.2010 to 5.2.2018, though he is getting the exemption thereafter.
The petitioner therefore wants that the electricity duty paid by him during the above period from 21.1.2010 till 5.1.2018 be refunded to him.
The further submission is that in respect of similar matters respondent no. 3 is ordinarily directing for refund of duties but in the case of the petitioner he is sitting tight over the matter. The petitioner has applied for refund of the electricity duty as aforesaid vide application dated 14.5.2018 but till date no order has been passed on it. The amount deposited by the petitioner as electricity duty is a huge amount deposited and non refund of the same is causing great financial hardship to the petitioner affecting his business.
We fail to understand the attitude of respondent no. 3 in not dealing the above application of the petitioner when the matter had already been settled by the Supreme Court and it has been held that all such industries which have been established after the enforcement of the policy are eligible to exemption from the date of the notification dated 21.1.2010 for a period of 10 years thereafter, meaning thereby that in case the petitioner has paid any duty during the said period, he is entitled to refund of the same.
In view of the aforesaid facts and circumstances, we dispose of the writ petition with the direction to respondent no. 3 to consider the matter of refund of the electricity duty paid by the petitioner for the above period in accordance with law most expeditiously within a period one month from the date a copy of this order is produced before him. In the event of any delay in consideration of the matter, respondent no. 3 shall be held personally liable for the same and it will be open for the petitioner to move application in this petition itself for necessary further action.
The writ petition is disposed of.
Order Date :- 29.5.2019 SKS