JUDGMENT :

U. Durga Prasad Rao, J.

This appeal is preferred by the defendant aggrieved by the judgment dated 19.06.2018 in O.S.No.108/2012 passed by the learned Judge of the Family Court-cum-IX Additional District & Sessions Court, East Godavari, Rajamahendravaram decreeing the plaintiff’s suit for Rs.71,23,450/- with costs and interest @ 12% p.a. from the date of suit till the date of decree and subsequent interest at 6% p.a. from the date of decree till the date of realization, against the plaintiff’s claim of Rs.87,56,508/-.

2. The factual matrix of the case is thus:

The plaintiff is the Velugubanda Grama Panchayat rep. by its Secretary, whereas the defendant is the Koundinya Educational Society rep. by its Secretary and Correspondent Sri Kalidindi Satyanarayanaraju. The plaintiff’s case is that the defendant is running Engineering College and other colleges in its premises and the plaintiff proposed to assess the educational institutions of the defendant to house tax for the first time for the years 2007-2008 to 2011- 2012 vide panchayat resolution dated 18.11.2011 and pursuant to thereof, special notices dated 21.11.2011 were issued for recovery of arrears of house tax for the years 2007-2008 to 2010-2011 under Ex.A1 and for the year 2011-12 under Ex.A2. The defendant neither challenged the said notices nor paid the tax. Hence, a demand notice dated 24.12.2011 was issued under Ex.A3. The defendant did not pay the amount. In the meanwhile, the Government and the District Panchayat Officer issued Memos directing the plaintiff Gram Panchayat to collect arrears of the taxes and hence, the Panchayat resolution dated 30.06.2012 was passed and thereafter suit was filed for recovery of house tax from the defendant for a sum of Rs.87,56,508/- as follows:

The defendant opposed the suit mainly on two grounds. Firstly that the special notices issued under exhibits A1 & A2 were not served on the defendant and even otherwise those special notices are not legally tenable because they do not contain the particulars as to the capital value of the building of the defendant and the method and manner in which the year tax was arrived at by the plaintiff. Further, the plaintiff has not provided an opportunity to the defendant to question the legality of the assessment by seeking revision. Further, the plaintiff has not taken into consideration the proper value of the subject building and its depreciation etc. Nextly, the claim of the plaintiff since exceeded the period of three years same is barred by limitation.

(a) During trial, PWs 1 and 2 were examined and exhibits A1 to A9 were marked on behalf of the plaintiff and on behalf of the defendant DW1 was examined and exhibits B1 to B4 were marked.

(b) The trial Court considered the aforesaid two objections of the defendant. So far as the challenge with regard to the validity of special notices and non-furnishing of opportunity to question the correctness of the assessment is concerned, the trial Court observed that Exs.A1 & A2-special notices and Ex.A3-registered demand notice were served on the defendant, but he failed to challenge the same before the concerned authority which can be seen from the cross examination of DW1 and hence, he cannot now question the validity of the notices. Accordingly, the trial Court turned down the contention of the defendant that exhibits A1 to A3 were not valid notices. The trial Court also turned down the contention of the defendant that his institution being an educational institution, it is exempted from paying the taxes. The trial Court observed that the exempted categories under Ex.A5 were different from the educational institutions and he