The provisions of Section 206C of the Income-tax Act, as amended, are not applicable to L-13 licensees.

A.L.Bahri, J.

1. Vide this order a bunch of Civil Writ Petitions (C.W.Ps. Nos. 5085, 5086, 5501, 5502, 5503, 5513, 5514, 5988, 5989-A, 6060, 6062, 6305, 6306, 6487, 6488, 6987, 7523, 7552, 7668 and 8521-22 of 1992) are being disposed of as the question of fact and law involved therein is common. The main judgment is prepared in C. W. P. No. 5085 of 1992 (K. K. Mittal and Co. v. Union of India).

2. The petitioners in all the cases are L-13 licensees of liquor. They deal with the sale of country liquor and have been granted licences for the period April 1, 1992, to March 31, 1993. The licences have been granted to them at a fixed licence fee. At the time of purchase of liquor, income-tax at the rate of 15 per cent, was charged by the distilleries. Some of the distilleries have also been impleaded as respondents. Apart from the income-tax, an additional surcharge at the rate of 1.8 per cent. of the total purchase price is also being charged. The distilleries are supposed to deposit this amount deducted towards income-tax into the treasury. Those distilleries are respondents Nos. 3 to 6. The petitioners purchased country liquor from them at the price fixed by the Excise and Taxation Department and further the petitioners are supposed to sell the liquor at the price fixed by the Excise and Taxation Department. The details of the price fixed are also given, i.e., the petitioner is supposed to sell the liquor at the rate of Rs. 140.77 per box, after purchasing the same at the fixed price of Rs. 58.96 plus Rs. 79.20 as still head duty total being Rs. 138.16 per box. the prices are fixed under Rule 38(15) of the Haryana Liquor Licence Rules, 1970. A copy of the letter fixing such price is annexure P-l.

3. In the earlier year also, the distilleries used to deduct the alleged income-tax and surcharge in view of Sections 44AC(1) and 206C of the Income-tax Act. The writ petition was filed by K. K. Mittal and Co. (Writ Petition No. 7161 of 1989-[l991] 187 ITR 208 (P & H)). The writ petition was admitted for hearing and ad interim stay of recovery was ordered. Ultimately, the writ petition was decided on May 4, 1990. The writ petition was allowed prohibiting the distilleries from deducting or charging income-tax from L-13 licensees. Further, a direction was given not to charge or deduct income-tax on excise duty payable by the wine contractors of L-14 licensees. The Income-tax Act was amended. Section 44AC was deleted. However, its substantive portion was included in Section 206C. Thus, for the current year 1992-93, the distilleries again started deducting income-tax as referred to above on the sale of liquor from the petitioners who are L-13 licensees. The petitioners have approached this court in these writ petitions.

4. The case of the petitioners is that the ratio of the decision of this court in K, K. Mittals case which is reported as [1991] 187 ITR 208, would be applicable to the provisions of Section 206C of the Income-tax Act as amended, as there is no practical change in the phraseology used with respect to L-13 licensees.

5. On the other hand, the stand taken by the State in the written statement is that the validity of the provisions of Sections 44AC and 206C of the Income-tax Act was unsuccessfully challenged in Sat Pal and Co. v. Excise and Taxation Commissioner [1990] 185 ITR 375, a Division Bench case of this court. That being the position, even from L-13 licensees, income-tax could be deducted at the time of purchase of liquor by them from the distilleries which is to be deposited in the treasury. The question as to whether the assessee would in fact be liable to pay tax to that extent, would be determined by the income-tax authorities when the return for the relevant year is filed and adjudicated. It is further asserted that usually L-13 licence is granted to those persons who are already L-14 licensees. With respect to L-14 licences, it was alleged that income-tax could be deducted at the initial stage of purchase o