RAMACHANDRA IYER, J.

These appeals, which are filed under Clause 15 of the Letters Patent against the judgment of Rajagopala Ayyangar, J., in W.P. Nos. 1287, 1288 and 1469 of 1956, raise a common question relating to the constitutional validity of the revised rules 15 and 16 of the Turnover and Assessment Rules made by the Government of Madras under sections 3, 5 and 19 of the Madras General Sales Tax Act, 1939, and published in the Fort St. George Gazette on 7th September, 1955. The appellants in the various appeals are tanners and dealers in hides and skins, tanned and untanned. The respondent in the respective appeals issued notices to them, calling upon them to submit returns and pay tax in advance in accordance with rule 5 of the Madras General Sales Tax Rules and the revised rules 15 and 16 of the Turnover and Assessment Rules. The appellants, therefore, moved this court by means of the petitions aforesaid for the issue of a writ under Article 226 of the Constitution to direct the respondent to forbear from enforcing the rules, after declaring them illegal. The case for the appellants is that rules 15 and 16 of the Turnover and Assessment Rules, which were published on 7th September, 1955, were invalid, as being contrary to the provisions of Article 286(3) of the Constitution before the amendment.

The Madras General Sales Tax Act, 1939, authorises the State to impose a tax on the sale of goods. Under section 3 of the Act, the tax is levied on an annual turnover of a dealer, which comprises the sale or in certain cases the purchase price of the goods. The tax being leviable on the occasion of a sale of a particular article, there could, on the terms of that provision, be as many levies as there were sales of that commodity within the State of Madras, resulting in multi-point levy on the same article. The Act provided exemptions and reductions in certain cases. Dealers, having an annual turnover of less than Rs. 10, 000 were exempted. Certain goods, for example, hand-woven clothes were totally exempted. In regard to certain others, the multi-point levy was avoided by a scheme of a single point levy, that is, the sales tax being levied only on one occasion of the series of sales that may take place within the State with regard to that commodity. Section 5 provided for the cases where exemptions were granted and where the levy was confined to a single point. Hides and skins got the benefit of a single point levy. Section 3(4) states that, for the purposes of the Act, the turnover, on which tax on sale of goods had to be ascertained, was to be in accordance with such rules as might be prescribed. Section 5(vi) says that the sale of hides and skins, whether tanned or untanned, shall be liable to tax under section 3, sub-section (1), only at such single point in the series of sales by successive dealers, as may be prescribed. Thus, rules have to be framed for determining the turnover, and, in the case of hides and skins, prescribing the single point in the series of sales at which the tax could be levied. Rules 15 and 16 provided for the levy of tax on hides and skins. The original rules under the Act came into force on 1st October, 1939. Various defects were noticed in the rules, and anomalies came to light in their actual application; evasion was found possible. The learned Judge has, in his judgment, set out in detail the relevant provision of the statute and the rules and difficulties that were found in its application. The rules had to be recast, and the Government did so. In the place of the old rules 15 and 16, they made the impugned rules. The new rules came into force on 7th September, 1955.The case for the appellants was that the rules which had the effect of imposing a tax had not, before their promulgation, been reserved for the consideration of the President under Article 286(3) of the Constitution, and as such would be invalid.

At the time when the rules were framed, Article 286(3) of the Constitution dec