Supreme Court on scope for exercise of discretion under sect

RELEVANT EXTRACTS : ** ** ** ** ** ** 13. It is a well-settled principle in law that the court cannot read anything into a statutory provision or a stipulated condition which is plain and unambiguous. A statute is an edict of the legislature. The language employed in a statute is the determinative factor of legislative intent. Similar is the position for conditions stipulated in advertisements. 14. Words and phrases are symbols that stimulate mental references to referents. The object of interpreting a statute is to ascertain the intention of the legislature enacting it. (See Institute of Chartered Accountants of India v. Price Waterhouse 1977 6 SCC 312). The intention of the legislature is primarily to be gathered from the language used, which means that attention should be paid to what has been said as also to what has not been said. As a consequence, a construction which requires for its support, addition or substitution of words or which results in rejection of words as meaningless has to be avoided. As observed in Crawford v. Spooner (1846) 6 MOO PC1, the courts cannot aid the legislature's defective phrasing of an Act, they cannot add or mend, and by construction make up deficiencies which are left there. (See State of Gujarat v. Dilipbhai Nathjibhai Patel 1998 (3) SCC 234). It is contrary to all rules of construction to read words into an Act unless it is absolutely necessary to do so. [See Stock v. Frank Jones (Tipton) Ltd 1978 (1) ALL ER 948.] Rules of interpretation do not permit the courts to do so, unless the provision as it stands is meaningless or of doubtful meaning. The courts are not entitled to read words into an Act of Parliament unless clear reason for it is to be found within the four corners of the Act itself. (Per Lord Loreburn, L.C. in Vickers Sons") 15. The question is not what may be supposed and has been intended but what has been said. "Statutes should be construed not as theorems of Euclid", Judge Learned Hand said, "but words must be construed with some imagination of the purposes which lie behind them". (See Lenigh Valley Coal Co. v. Yensavage 218 FR 547) The view was reiterated in Union of India v. Filip Tiago De Gama of Vedem Vasco De Gama (1990) 1 SCC 277 (SCC p. 284, para 16). 16. In D.R. Venkatachalam v. Dy. Transport Commr. (1977) 2 SCC 273, it was observed that the courts must avoid the danger of a priori determination of the meaning of a provision based on their own preconceived notions of ideological structure or scheme into which the provision to be interpreted is somewhat fitted. They are not entitled to usurp legislative function under the disguise of interpretation. 17. While interpreting a provision the court only interprets the law and cannot legislate it. If a provision of law is misused and subjected to the abuse of process of law, it is for the legislature to amend, modify or repeal it, if deemed necessary. (See CST v. Popular Trading Co. (2000) 5 SCC 511) The legislative casus omissus cannot be supplied by judicial interpretative process. 18. Two principles of construction - one relating to casus omissus and the other in regard to reading the statute as a whole, appear to be well settled. Under the first principle a casus omissus cannot be supplied by the court except in the case of clear necessity and when reason for it is found in the four corners of the statute itself but at the same time a casus omissus should not be readily inferred and for that purpose all the parts of a statute or section must be construed together and every clause of a section should be construed with reference to the context and other clauses thereof so that the construction to be put on a particular provision makes a consistent enactment of the whole statute. This would be more so if literal construction of a particular clause leads to manifestly absurd or anomalous results which could not have been intended by the legislature. "An intention to produce an unreasonable result", said Danckwerts, L.J. in Artemiou v. Procopiou (1965) 3 ALL ER 539 (All ER p. 544 I) "is not to be imputed to a statute if there is some other construction available". Where to apply words literally would "defeat the obvious intention of the legislation and produce a wholly unreasonable result", we must "do some violence to the words" and so achieve that obvious intention and produce a rational construction. [Per Lord Reid in Luke v. IRC (1963) AC 557 where at AC p. 577 he also observed: (All ER p.664 I) "This is not a new problem, though our standard of drafting is such. 19. It is then true that: "When the words of a law extend not to an inconvenience rarely happening, but due to those which often happen, it is good reason not to strain the words further than they reach, by saying it is casus omissus, and that the law intended quae frequentius accidunt." "But", on the other hand, "it is no reason, when the words of a law do enough extend to an inconvenience seldom happening, that they should not extend to it as well as if it happened more frequently, because it happens but seldom". (See Fenton v. Hampton (1858) 11 MOO PC 347). 20. A casus omissus ought not to be created by interpretation, save in some case of strong necessity. Where, however, a casus omissus does really occur, either through the inadvertence of the legislature, or on the principle quod enim semel aut bis existit praetereunt legislatores, the rule is that the particular case, thus left unprovided for, must be disposed of according to the law as it existed before such statute - casus omissus et oblivioni datus dispositioni communis juris relinquitur; "a casus omissus", observed Buller, J. in Jones v. Smart 1785 (1) TR 44:99 ER 963 (ER p. 967) "can in no case be supplied by a court of law, for that would be to make laws". The principles were examined in detail in Maulavi Hussein Haji Abraham Umarji v. State of Gujarat (2004 (6) SCC 672). 21. The golden rule for construing all written instruments has been thus stated: "The grammatical and ordinary sense of the words is to be adhered to unless that would lead to some absurdity or some repugnance or inconsistency with the rest of the instrument, in which case the grammatical and ordinary sense of the words may be modified, so as to avoid that absurdity and inconsistency, but no further." (See Grey v. Pearson.) 22. The latter part of this "golden rule" must, however, be applied with much caution. "If", remarked Jervis, C.J., "the precise words used are plain and unambiguous, in our judgment, we are bound to construe them in their ordinary sense, even though it do lead, in our view of the case, to an absurdity or manifest injustice. Words may be modified or varied, where their import is doubtful or obscure. But we assume the functions of legislators when we depart from the ordinary meaning of the precise words used, merely, because we see, or fancy we see, an absurdity or manifest injustice from an adherence to their literal meaning". (See Abley v. Dale, ER p.525) 23. The above position was highlighted in Sangeeta Singh v. Union of India and Ors. (2005 (7) SCC 484). 24. It is of significance to note that the conceptual and contextual difference between Section 271(1) (c) and Section 276C of the IT Act was lost sight of in Dilip Shroff's case (supra). 25. The Explanations appended to Section 272(1)(c) of the IT Act entirely indicates the element of strict liability on the assessee for concealment or for giving inaccurate particulars while filing return. The judgment in Dilp N. Shroof's case (supra) has not considered the effect and relevance of Section 276C of the I.T. Act. Object behind enactment of Section 271 (1)(e) read with Explanations indicate that the said section has been enacted to provide for a remedy for loss of revenue. The penalty under that provision is a civil liability. Wilful concealment is not an essential ingredient for attracting civil liability as is the case in the matter of prosecution under Section 276C of the I.T. Act. 26. In Union Budget of 1996-97, Section 11AC of the Act was introduced. It has made the position clear that there is no scope for any discretion. In para 136 of the Union Budget reference has been made to the provision stating that the levy of penalty is a mandatory penalty. In the Notes on Clauses also the similar indication has been given. ** ** ** ** ** **