Ajay Kumar Mittal, J.

1. Prayer in this petition is for declaring the provisions of Section 62(5) of the Punjab Value Added Tax Act, 2005 (in short, the PVAT Act”) to be ultravires the Constitution of India being violative of Article 14 as it provides mandatory deposit of 25% tax, interest and penalty as a condition precedent for hearing of appeal without giving any discretion to the appellate authority to waive such deposit. Further prayer has been made for quashing the orders dated 19.12.2012, 29.11.2013 and 12.2.2015, Annexures P.1, P.3, P.3/A, P.5 and P.6 respectively.

2. A few facts relevant for the decision of the controversy involved as narrated in the petition may be noticed. The petitioner is a dealer duly registered under the provisions of the PVAT Act as well as the Central Sales Tax Act, 1956 (in short, “the CST Act”). It is engaged in the business of running a rice mill at Faridkot. It is an exempted unit having been granted exemption from 10.12.1999 to 9.12.2009. The petitioner had an unutilised exemption of Rs.68,84,716/- as on 1.4.2005. For the assessment year 200809, the petitioner was entitled to exemption upto 9.12.2009 whereafter it was liable to pay tax