JUDGMENT

Dr. Arijit Pasayat, J. —

1. Leave granted.

2. Challenge in this appeal is to the judgment of a Division Bench of the Madhya Pradesh High Court dismissing the writ petition and miscellaneous petitions filed by the appellant.

3. Factual position as projected by the appellant before the High Court is as follows:

The appellant is a Government Company. Its ‘Malanjakhand Copper Mining & Ore Concentration Project’ is situated in District Balaghat, where it is engaged in extraction of copper ore, by open cast mining process. The appellant has described the process thus: After drilling and blasting the ore in the open pit mine, the ore in the form of boulders are transported to the Primary Crusher (situated at a distance of 2.53 Km from the Mine), where it is crushed into pebbles/pieces. Such crushed ore is then carried on a conveyor to a Secondary Crusher (situated at about 5 Km from the mine) for further crushing into smaller pebbles. The small pieces/pebbles are then carried by a conveyor to the Concentrator Plant (situated at 5.5 km from the mine). In the Concentrator Plant, the ore is milled into powder in the Ball Mills. Such powder mixed with water is carried in the form of slurry to floatation cells. In the floatation cells, the slurry is subjected to Froth Floatation Process and the copper concentrate is removed and dried in vacuum Driers and stored in Concentrate Storage Sheds. The tailing pumps are at a distance of 8 km. From the Large quantity of water is required for Concentrator Plant for being used in milling. Water is also required for the factory township. The required water is pumped from the mines through pumps located at an Intake Well (situated at a distance of 10 Km from the mine). From the intake well, water is pumped to Water Treatment Plant (situated at a distance of 6 km from the mine).

According to the appellant, its activities consist of two distinct parts. First is mining, that is drilling, blasting and collecting of ore which is carried on at mine pit. This activity is carried on in the mine area registered under the Mines Act, 1952. The second is processing, which is carried on at the Primary Crusher, Secondary Crusher and Concentrator Plant. The processing (manufacturing) part of the activities are carried in the factory area. The Primary Crusher, the Secondary Crusher, the Ball Mill, the Concentrator Plant, the Tailing Pumps, the intake well and the Water Treatment Plant are situated away from the mine, at distances varying 2.5 KM to 10 KM and are registered separately as a ‘Factory’ under the provisions of Factories Act, 1948. The open pit mine (mining area) and the processing plants/machineries (Factory area) are all situated in a large tract of land taken on mining lease from the State Government. The M.P. Electricity Duty Act, 1949 (in short ‘the Act’) enacted by the State Legislature provides for levy of electricity duty (in short ‘the duty’) on sale or consumption of electrical energy. Section 3 of the Act provides that every distributor of electrical energy and every producer shall pay every month to the State Government at the prescribed time and in the prescribed manner, a duty calculated at the rates specified (in the Table given below the Section) on the units of electrical energy sold or supplied to a consumer, or consumed by himself for his own purposes or for purposes of his township or colony, during the preceding month. Part-B of the Table prescribes the rate of electricity duty on the electrical energy sold/supplied for consumption for different specified purposes, namely domestic, non-domestic & Commercial, industrial and non-industrial. Industrial purpose is further divided into four categories, one of which is ‘for mines other than captive mines of a Cement industry’ (vide Energy 3). The term ‘mine’ is defined in the Explanation (b) to Section 3 of the Act, as ‘a mine to which the Mines Act, 1952 applies and includes the premises or machinery situated in or adjacent to a min