The High Court of Madhya Pradesh has directed the Excise Commissioner of MP to hear the representation by the petitioner for exemption of license fee of liquor shops within two weeks.
The petition was filed seeking exemption of license fees for his Liquor shops for the period of closure of the shops by the owner of two different license liquor shops at two different locations in the State.
The petitioner filed the petition seeking the following reliefs:
- The order demanding license fees be quashed for the period that the shops were closed.
- Exemption be granted from payment of license fees of 10 days from March 21st to March 31st for his License Liquor Shops. The shops included his shops of foreign liquor and Country liquor.
The petitioner Counsel submitted before the Court that before filing the petition, the petitioner had already submitted a representation before the Authorities seeking the reliefs. His representation was however rejected without giving him any opportunity of hearing. The Counsel also suggested that petitioner would be willing to withdraw the present petition if he is given a liberty to file another detailed and comprehensive representation through e- mail within a week, and the Court is willing to issue direction to the Excise Commissioner of M.P., Gwalior to decide the same in a time bound manner and also after affording an opportunity of hearing to the petitioner.
The Advocate General assured the Court that if the petitioner is allowed to submit a representation through email within a week, the same will be considered and decided by the authorities in the next two weeks and due opportunity of hearing through video conferencing will be given to the petitioner.
The Court therefore directed the petitioner to pass a speaking order in period of 2 weeks if a new representation is filed by the petitioner in one week. The Court also directed that the previous order that was passed without affording opportunity of hearing to the petitioner should not be considered.
Read the Order Here;
MP-WP__FinalOrder_13-May-2020-India Legal Bureau