Writ Court can interfere & quash a show cause notice if it is an order by itself & issued with a pre-meditated mind

Hon’ble Division Bench of the Hon’ble Calcutta High Court in the matter M/s. Joyous Block & Panels Private Limited. & Anr. Vs. Assistant Commissioner, Commercial Taxes, Ballygunge charge & Anr. M.A.T. 1931 of 2022 in its judgment dated 21.12.2022 has set aside the show cause notices on the ground that writ court can interfere if the show cause notice is an order by itself and not a show cause notice and it is pre-meditated then the Courts are entitled to interfere with the said order.

It was held by the Hon’ble High Court that the view taken by the learned single Bench that a writ petition against the show cause notice is not maintainable is well settled. Equally well-settled is the legal principle that there are exceptions to this self-imposed restriction by the Constitutional courts. If a show cause notice suffers from the vice of lack of jurisdiction, Courts are entitled to interfere with the same. If the show cause notice is an order by itself and not a show cause notice and it is pre-meditated then the Courts are entitled to interfere with the said order.

The Hon’ble Division Bench relied upon the judgment of Hon’ble Supreme Court in Siemens India vs. State of Maharashtra reported at 2007 (207) ELT 168 (SC) wherein a challenge was made to a show cause notice and the Hon’ble Supreme Court held that although ordinarily a writ Court may not exercise its discretionary jurisdiction in entertaining a writ petition questioning a notice to show cause unless the same inter alia appears to have been without jurisdiction. When a notice is issued with premeditation a writ petition may not be maintainable, in such an event even if the Court directs the statutory authority to hear the matter afresh, ordinarily such hearing would not yield any fruitful purpose.

Relying upon aforesaid principles, Hon’ble Division Bench quashed the show cause notice and the matter was remanded back to the authority with a direction to issue a fresh show cause notice with an open mind without pre-deciding any issue and giving adequate opportunity to the appellants to submit their reply and thereafter the case to be adjudicated in accordance with law.

This matter was represented on behalf of appellants/petitioners by Advocate Vinay Shraff with Advocate Priya Sarah Paul and Advocate Priyanka Sharma and on behalf of respondents by Ld. G.P., Mr. T M Siddique, Mr. Debasish Ghosh, Mr. Nilotpal Chatterjee, Mr. V Kothari, Mr. K K Maity, Mr. Tapan Bhanja.