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Writ Petition No. 2337 of 1981, decided on 2nd December, 1981.

Ss. 2 & 6‑‑Petitioner not dealing with any agricultural produce- Not liable to obtain licence from Market Committee‑‑Notice issued to petitioner to obtain licence held, illegal.

Ch. Khushi Muhammad Akhtar for Petitioner.

Ch. Zahoor‑ul‑Haq for Respondents.

Date of hearing: 2nd December, 1981.

The petitioner is a soap maker and carries on his business within the limits of Market Committee, Pattoki. He has been served with a notice by the said Committee to obtain a licence for carrying on his business. A licence is obtainable on payment of a fee of Rs.200. He has challenged the legality of the said notice.

2. Under section 6(t), Punjab Agricultural Produce Markets Ordinance any person who wishes to work as a 'dealer' within the limits of Market Committee has to obtain a licence from the Market Committee. For the purposes of the Ordinance, a dealer', as defined in section 2(b) thereof means any person who within the area of a Market Committee sets up, establishes, or uses or allows to be used any place for the purchase or sale of the agricultural produce.

3. The case of the petitioner is that in the process of making soap he does not use any article which may be described as an agricultural produce Thus, the contents of his soap are fats, sodium silicate, soap stone and caustic soda. Consequently, he is not, a dealer' within the meaning oil section 2(b) or section 6(l).

4. Section 2(b) of the Ordinance gives a list of the articles which are to be treated as agricultural produce. The learned counsel appearing for the Market Committee did not dispute that this list did not include any of the constituents of the soap made by the petitioner. He also did not take up the a position that there was any notification in existence which would make any of those constituents an agricultural. produce. I may also mention here that I had given an opportunity to the learned counsel for the responder; to have the soap, made by the petitioner analysed from a laboratory.

5. It is therefore quite clear that the petitioner does not deal with an agricultural produce and consequently he is not liable to obtain a licence from the market committee as required by section 6(1) of the Ordinance to the circumstances I would declare the notice issued to the petitioner by the respondent as illegal and of no effect, The petitioner shall also have the costs of this petition.