VEERASWAMI, J.

These petitions under Article 226 of the Constitution concern the scope validity of the powers of search and seizure of account books and other records and of confiscation of goods seized or imposition of penalties in lieu thereof under the provisions of the Madras General Sales Tax Act, 1959. They involve the construction and interpretation of section 41, the legislative competency of some of its provisions and their constitutional vires.

At about 5 p.m. on 19th August, 1964, certain officers of the Commercial Taxes Department, Intelligence Wing, under the personal direction and supervision of the Deputy Commissioner of Commercial Taxes (Intelligence), Madras, raided the premises of Zenith Lamps and Electricals, Ltd., Madhavaram, inspected, searched and seized therefrom in the presence, among others, of one of the managing directors Mr. B. D. Mimani, a small leather suit-case with a khaki cover and certain records found on the top of the suit-case. The Deputy Commissioner, as he says in his counter-affidavit, had specific information that some secret account books relating to the various businesses in which one Sri Goenka was interested, were removed from