DR. D. Y. CHANDRACHUD, J. : - Rule, by consent of Counsel returnable forthwith. Respondents waive service. By consent and at the request of Counsel, taken up for hearing and final disposal.

A purchaser in a sale conducted by the State Financial Corporation has challenged an attachment levied under the Employees Provident Funds and Miscellaneous Provisions Act, 1952. The issues that have been canvassed before the Court here relate to (i) the meaning and extent of the first charge statutorily created by section 11(2) of the EPF Act, 1952; (ii) whether, as the petitioner contends, the charge cannot be enforced in the hands of a purchaser in a sale conducted under the State Financial Corporation Act, 1951; and (iii) whether the charge and the priority created by Parliament in the payment of PF dues is confined to insolvency and winding up alone. We have declined to accept the line of argument pressed before us. The first charge on the assets of the establishment created by Parliament while enacting section 11(2) of the EPF Act, 1952 and the priority enunciated there is given overriding effect, notwithstanding anything to the contrary contained in any law for the time being in