Page 90 - GSTL_2nd July 2020 _Vol 38_Part 1

8 GST LAW TIMES [ Vol. 38
(2) that it is the accepted doctrine of the American
Courts, which I consider to be well-founded on princi-
ple, that the presumption is always in favour of the
constitutionality of an enactment, and the burden is
upon him who attacks it to show that there has been a
clear transgression of the constitutional principles. A
clear enunciation of this latter doctrine is to be found in
Middleton v. Texas Power and L. Company, (248 U.S. 152
and 157), in which the relevant passage runs as
follows :
It must be presumed that a legislature under-
stands and correctly appreciates the need of its own
people, that its laws are directed to problems made
manifest by expression and that its discriminations
are based upon adequate grounds.”
and this view has been consistently followed thereafter.
59. Thus in M/s. B.R. Enterprises v. State of U.P. and Others -
AIR 1999 SC 1867 this Court observed :
“Another principle which has to be borne in mind in examining
the constitutionality of a statute is that it must be assumed that the legis-
lature understands and appreciates the need of the people and the laws
it enacts are directed to problems which are made manifest by experi-
ence and that the elected representatives assembled in a legislature en-
act laws which they consider to be reasonable for the purpose for which
they are enacted. Presumption is, therefore, in favour of the constitu-
tionality of an enactment, vide Charanjit Lal Chaowdhury v. Union of In-
dia, 1950 SCR 869 : (AIR 1951 SC 41); State of Bombay v. F.N. Bulsara, 1951
SCR 682 : (AIR 1951 SC 318), Mahant Moti Das v. S.P. Sahi (AIR 1959 SC
942)”.
The following passage in Seervai, Constitutional Law of India
(3rd Edn.) page 119 found approval in Delhi Transport Corporation v.
D.T.C. Mazdoor Congress, 1991 (Supp) 1 SCC 600 : (AIR 1991 SC 101).
The Court held :
“Seervai in his book Constitutional Law of India (3rd Edn) has
stated at page 119 that :
”the courts are guided by the following rules in dis-
charging their solemn duty to declare laws passed by a
legislature unconstitutional :
(1) There is a presumption in favour of constitu-
tionality and a law will not be declared unconstitu-
tional unless the case is so clear as to be free from
doubt; ‘to doubt the constitutionality of a law is to
resolve it in favour of its validity’.
(2) A statute cannot be declared unconstitution-
al merely because in the opinion of the Court it vio-
lates one or more of the principles of liberty, of the
spirit of the Constitution, unless such principles
and that spirit are found in the terms of the Consti-
tution” (emphasis supplied)

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