Case: Municipal Board, Mainpuri Vs. Kanhaiya Lal

2. The State Government issued a notification defining the municipal limits of the town of Mainpuri. Under this notification theof the Mainpuri railway station is included within Mainpuri municipal limits. but the rest of the station is excluded therefrom. A motorable road connects the station with the main inhabited area of the town. The Municipality fixed a tollbarrier on this road between the railwayand the inhabited area of the town. The Mainpuri Electric Supply and General Mills Co. Ltd., Mainpuri, supplies electricity to Mainpuri town. It purchases coal from places outside Mainpuri and receives the same in railway wagons, which are unloaded and kept in theThe respondent owns a truck. He was engaged to carry the coal from theto the premises of the electric Company, which is inside the town. He loaded his truck with coal at the railway goods shed and was taking the same to the premises of the electric Company, when he was asked to payer, but he did not pay it. He was prosecuted under Section 299(1) of the Act, read with Rule 1 of the Rules for assessment and collection of toll tax. The respondent denied his liability to pay the tax. TheMagistrate convicted him under the said Section and directed him to pay a fine of Rs.On appeal, the learned Sessions Judge, Mainpuri, confirmed the same. In revision, the High Court set aside the conviction and acquitted the accused. The Municipality by special leave has preferred this appeal.

Court's reasoning:
The following ingredients of the offence may be gathered from a combined reading of the said provisions: (1) The toll is on vehicles; (2) a person cannot bring a laden vehicle without paying the prescribed toll within the limits of the Municipality from without; (3) the person in charge of such vehicle must pay a toll at the barrier; and (4) if he does not pay, he is liable to punishment. It is clear from the wording of the provisions that they are designed for collecting toll from laden vehicles entering the municipal limit from without. Subject to any general rules or special orders of the State Government in this behalfit is not suggested that there are any suchthe municipal boards power under S. 128(vii) of the Act to levy toll on conveyances is confined only to those "entering the municipality".The word "entering" in S. 128(vii) of the Act clearly indicates that the conveyance to be liable to the toll must enter the Municipality from places outside it. By no stretch of language it is possible to hold that a vehicle which is already in the limits of the Municipality, when it plies for hire, enters the municipal limits. So too, the words "bring within the limits of Mainpuri Municipality" in Rule 1 emphasize the idea that a laden vehicle cannot be brought within the Municipality until the toll due has been paid. One cannot bring within the Municipality a vehicle which is already in the Municipality.Confronted with the clear terminology used both in the Section as well as in the Rules, the learned counsel for the appellant attempted to argue that the words "Mainpuri Municipality" are comprehensive enough to take in part or parts of that Municipality and, therefore, when a laden vehicle passes from one part of the Municipality to another part, it has to pay toll if there is a barrier between the two parts. This argument may perhaps be ingenious, but to our mind it is clearly unsound.We find it well nigh impossible to hold that a vehicle is brought within the limits of the Municipality when it is brought from one part of the Municipality to another part.