Case: Links Advertisers &amp; Business Promoters Vs. Commissioner, Corporation Of The City Ofb

The facts of the case lie within a narrow compass and the point raised by counsel for the appellant is one of first impression and undoubtedly requires serious consideration. The appellant is a firm of advertising commercial goods and other items by putting up hoardings containing advertisements on properties taken on lease licence from various owners. The appellant also has been put ting up hoardings on railway lands in the compound of the Bangalore Railway Station. In the instant case, we are only concerned with the hoardings containing advertisements put up adjacent to. the railway compound fencing but within the railway premises by being placed on girders affixed to. the earth. The fencing of the railway compound is adjacent to and faces a public street. It is also not disputed by the parties that the advertisements are put up at sufficient height so. as to be clearly visible to and attract the attention of the members of the general public passing through the public street. The appellant has produced photographs of some of the hoardings which demonstrate these factsThe Municipal Corporation of the City of Bangalore being of the opinion that the hoardings containing advertisements put up by the appellant were exigible to tax issued a demand notice dated March 7, 1973 calling upon the. appellant to pay a sum of Rs. 5871-83 as the advertisement tax including arrears. The appellant represented to the Municipal authorities that as the hoardings containing advertisements were situate within the railway premises they squarely fell within clause (e) of the third proviso to s. 136 of the Act. The Municipal Corporation did not accept the contention of the appellants and pressed for-paying up the tax.The appellant then filed a writ petition before the High Court of Karnataka praying that the order of the Corporation demanding payment of tax be quashed, because the advertisements were clearly exempt from tax by virtue of the aforesaid proviso.. The writ petition was in the first instance heard by a single Judge who by his order dated April 4, 19.74 over ruled the contention of the appellant and dismissed the petition. Thereupon the appellant filed an appeal under the Letters Patent before a Division Bench which also affirmed the order of the single Judge, though on different grounds. The Division Bench later on being approached under Art. 133 of the Constitution granted a certificate of fitness and hence this appeal before us.

Court's reasoning:
The sine qua non for the application of this section is, therefore, that the advertisements displayed by any person must be to public view in any manner whatsoever. Once these conditions are satisfied, the person who exhibits the advertisements is liable to pay tax on such advertisements As, however, the Act was merely to regulate the premises falling within the Bangalore Municipal Corporation, it is obvious that the premises which did not fall within the Corporation or which belonged to other autonomous authorities could not be exigible to tax unless expressly so provided. Furthermore, it appears that the object of the Municipal Corporation in charging tax was to keep the public premises clean and water-tight and protect advertisements which may amount to nuisance, because the , Act lays down a procedure which has to be followed before the advertisements could be exhibited. Consistent with this object, there- fore, the third proviso to s. 136 of the Act grants an exemption from tax on any advertisement which is exhibited in any railway station or upon any wail or other property of a railway. Here also an exception is carved out which is that if such an advertisement, even though on any portion of the railway property, faces an y street it will not earn the exemptionWe have given anxious consideration to the arguments advanced by the learned counsel for the appellant, but on a proper interpretation of the proviso we are unable to accept the same. To. begin with, if the proviso is read with reference to the context, then it is absolutely clear that the verb "fronting" qualifies not t he wall or the property but the advertisement. The central subject-matter of s. 136 as also of the proviso is not a place or building but advertisement which alone attracted taxThe test, therefore, laid down by this proviso is that the Court has to see whether the advertisement affixed whether inside the compound of the railway or not fronts the street. If the advertisement fronts the street or faces the street even if it is within t he railway premises, it will be exigible to tax. For instance if the; hoardings containing the advertisements were affixed just behind the compound wall and the advertisements did not face the street at all but faced the other side of the railway station their back being to the street, then the advertisements will certainly be exempt from tax and the proviso would clearly apply. This seems to us to be the natural interpretation of the proviso having regard to the context in which it is placedAccording to the aforesaid dictionary meaning "fronting" merely means that the article should face or have its front toward, opposite or over against the house or the street. In our opinion the word "fronting" has been used in the proviso not in any leg al or technical sense but as used in ordinary parlance. It is not a term of art but one that signifies its meaning according to common notions. For these reasons, therefore, we are clearly of the opinion that as the advertisements upon the hoardings in the instant case were undoubtedly facing or fronting the street they were exigible to tax and the fact that they were a f[axed on the earth which formed the compound of the railway premises would make no difference in view of the plain and unambiguous language of the provisoIt is, therefore, clear that the meaning of the words used in a particular statute has to be construed with reference to the context and not in isolation, not is it possible to lay down any rule of universal application in a matter like this. For these reasons, therefore, this authority also does not appear to be apposite so far as the present case is concernedWe find ourselves in complete agreement with the view taken by the Single JudgeThe High Court does not appear to have interpreted the proviso correctly. Th e view of the High Court that the proviso would only apply to advertisements of such hoardings whose ownership lies with the Railway or which belong to the Railway is not borne out by cl. (e) of the third proviso to s. 236. In other words the question of exigibility to tax is relatable not to the ownership of the hoarding but its situs. Even if the hoarding does not belong to the Railway but to some private party, if it does not front the street and is situated within the Railway premises or within the compound of the railway premises it is clearly exempt. We, therefore, do not approve of the line of reasoning adopted by the Division Bench.On a close and careful interpretation, therefore, of cl. (e) of the third proviso to s. 136 of the Act we are clearly of the opinion that on the facts proved in the present case as the hoardings, containing the advertisements were fronting the public street and were clearly exposed to public view and the members of the public passing through the street, they are not covered by the exemption contemplated by the proviso and are, therefore, exigible to tax. The demand notice, therefore, served on the appellant by the Municipal Corporation for payment of tax is not legally erroneousFrom the photographs produced before us, as also before the High Court, it appears that the hoardings containing the advertisements are no doubt fixed just 2 or 3 feet behind the compound fencing of the railway station premisesThis authority, however, can have no application to the facts of the present case, because to begin with, there is nothing to show that the hoardings containing the advertisements were in any way fronting or facing the street. On the other hand, the advertisements were merely on the outside wall within the railway compound. In these circumstances, therefore, this case does not appear to be of any assistance to the appellant.