( 1 ) IN or about October 1947, the Government of West Bengal proposed to rent a portion of the structure then under construction at P. 17, Mission Row Extension in Calcutta, belonging to the petitioners and for the purpose of expediting the completion of the construction agreed to give them facilities for procuring cement, steel and other building materials by the issue of necessary permits, the said materials being then controlled goods.

( 2 ) IT is alleged in the petition that the Government after giving the facilities for some time stopped them.

( 3 ) ON 9-12-1948, the petitioners through their attorney wrote to the Secretary, Government of West Bengal, that if the Government was serious in taking the property on lease, facilities for obtaining the materials should be forthwith given and rent fixed. If on the other hand, the Government was unwilling to give such facilities, the petitioners would have no other alternative but to pub an end to the negotiations with the Government for renting the structure to the Government and would take steps to secure the materials otherwise and complete the buildings and let them to other persons.

( 4 ) THERE was no reply to t