( 1 ) THE famous city of Puri in the State of Orissa, is a municipality under the Orissa Municipal Act, 1950. Its limits extends up to the sea waters, on the side of the Bay of Bengal. Fish and prawn caught by fishermen from the sea have all along been brought within the municipal limit, sometimes through the nearest octroi checkpost on payment of octroi and more often without adopting that course. The fish and prawn are then taken to the market by fishermen where they are sold and bought by non-fishermen for local consumption or for export to other destinations. In the latter course, the goods inevitable are transported and have to pass out through octroi checkposts. The dispute between the parties i. e. the Puri Municipal Council and its officers on the one side and the Indian Tobacco Company Ltd. on the other, as projected before the High Court in writ proceedings centered around the question whether the taxing provisions of the Orissa Municipal Act and the bye-laws made thereunder, permitted the Purimunicipal Council to charge octroi tax on a non-fishermen merely found in possession of fish and prawn within the municipal area, or while taking them out through exit points, or oc