( 1 ) THIS application raises a point of public importance namely the right of a rate payer in a municipality to get a sufficient amount of filtered water for his domestic purposes. The facts are shortly as follows. The petitioners, who are ten in number, are all residents of Baranagar, in the district of 24-Parganas. They are all rate payers of the Baranagar Municipality (hereinafter referred to as the 'municipality') and are owners of residential houses, premises and holdings within the precincts of the said Municipality. The Commissioners of the Municipality have imposed a water-rate and the petitioners pay water-rates at the rate of 7 per cent. of the annual valuations of their holdings. The petitioners allege that in spite of the statutory duty on the part of the Municipality to provide them with an adequate supply of filtered water for domestic purposes, the supply is miserably insufficient, and is dwindling down progressively, until they cannot get even a few gallons of filtered water per day. It is apprehended that such shortage would lead to the breaking out of epidemic diseases in the locality. On the 8th and 20th April, 1953 and 25th May, 1953, the petitioner