Power of State Government to levy on royalty on excavation of brick earth – Punjab Minor Mineral Concession Rules, 1964: Held: Under Rules 54A, 54B and 54C of the Punjab Minor Mineral Concession Rules, 1964, the State Government is empowered to levy royalty on the production and disposal of minor minerals – In the present case, brick earth was declared as a minor mineral, and thus, the State Government was entitled to levy royalty on the same under the Punjab Minor Mineral Concession Rules, 1964. [Paras 11 and 12]
Issue of ownership of land becomes irrelevant, once the State is entitled to levy royalty:
Held: Once it is shown that under the Mineral Rules, the State Government was entitled to levy royalty on the activity of mining of brick earth, the issue of ownership of the said lands becomes irrelevant – The reason is that the owners of the said lands in which the excavation is made are not in the exempted category specified in Rule 3 of the Mineral Rules. [Para 13] Ownership of land and brick earth according to Wajib-ul-arz of the Village – Section 42 of the Punjab Land Revenue Act, 1887:
Held: In this case, the Respondents, who were operators of brick kilns filed a Suit against the State Government seeking to restrain the State Government from assessing, levying or recovering any royalty from the Respondents for excavation of earth – The Trial Court dismissed the Suit holding that u/s.42(1) of the Punjab Land Revenue Act, the quarry land would be vested in the State Government, since the Wajib-ul-arz did not specify that the quarries belonged to the Land owners – The Appellate Court also held that merely because the Wajib-ul-arz did not specifically mention about the ownership of the State over brick earth, it would not disentitle the State from levying tax on the mining of brick earth – The High Court, however, held that the State was not entitled to claim any royalty from the quarry operators – The Hon’ble Supreme Court held that the Courts below unnecessarily went into the issue of ownership of the lands and minerals therein, and that the only issue was about the right of the State Government to levy royalty. [Para 13]
As published in the Supreme Court Reports, Supreme Court of India. Headnotes prepared by: Vidhi Thaker, Hony. Associate Editor (Verified by: Shadan Farasat, Sr. Adv.). Text from the Indian Supreme Court Judgments open data set (Dattam Labs), CC BY 4.0.
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