' The question raised in this petition under Article 199 of the Constitution "relates to the powers of the Urban Local Councils to hold cattle markets, private, or otherwise, within their local areas. This question turns upon the interpretation of section 62 of the Punjab Local Government Ordinance, 1979 (to be referred to as the Ordinance).
2. The petitioner Muhammad Amin has been awarded the contract to hold cattle market outside the limits of the area of the Town Committee, Zafarwal, respondent No,1 herein. The period of the contract is from the 1st of March, 1992, to the 28th of February, 1995, "with a provision of 10% escalation every year on the basic price for which the contract was awarded". The total amount payable for the first year of the contract is Rs,40,000 out of it the petitioner has already paid Rs,16,800. The case of the petitioner is that by section 62, subsection (1-A) of the Ordinance, an Urban Local Council is expressly prohibited from holding a cattle market; private or otherwise, within its local area. The first respondent, Town Committee, Zafarwal, is, however, taking steps to hold a cattle market within its local area in contravention of the provisions contained in subsecfion (1-A) of section 62 of the Ordinance.
3. The petition has been opposed by the first respondent.
4. Section 62 of the Ordinance reads: "62. Private markets.--(1) No private market for the sale of articles of food or drink or animals shall be established or maintained within the local area of an urban local council except under a licence granted by the urban local council and in conformity with conditions of such licence.
(1-A) Notwithstanding anything contained in subsection (1) of section 101 and subject to sections 51 and 106 no cattle market private or otherwise shall be held within the local arc of an urban local council.
(2) An urban local council may levy fees in respect of private markets in the prescribed manner.
(3) An urban local council, may, by notice, require the owner of any private market to construct such works, provide such conveniences and make such arrangements for the maintenance of the market, and within such period as may be specified in the notice.
' Section 101 in so fat as it is relevant empowers an urban local council to establish and maintain public markets or to provide places for use as public markets for the sale of, articles of food and drink and of animals, and to secure the proper management and sanitation of such markets.
5. Section 51 of the Ordinance enumerates the functions which a Zila Council may and if Government so directs shall undertake; its item (xxxix-a) reads: "holding of cattle fairs, shows and markets in the limits of its local area in accordance with the bye- laws."
' This clause is followed by three provisos; the first proviso empowers a Zila Council to continue to hold cattle shows, fairs and markets in the limits of the local area of an urban local council if it had been holding such cattle fairs, shows and markets before the 17th of January, 1980; the second proviso says that a Zila Council shall not hold Bakar Mandis for sale of cattle meant for slaughter in the limits of local area of an urban local council but may hold battle fairs, shows and markets in such area even after the 17th. Of January, 1980, and the third, proviso enacts that if an urban local council, which had been holding cattle shows and fairs before the 17th of January, 1980, within the limits of its local arca, continues to hold the same, a Zila-Council shall not hold cattle fairs, shows and markets within a radius of three miles of the limits of local area of that local council.
6. Section 106, subsection (1) of the Ordinance prohibits an urban local council to "hold cattle shows and fairs within the limits of its local area" but permits an urban local council to "holdliakar Mandis for sale of cattle meant for slaughter and charge such fee per cattle head sold as the bye-laws may provide"; this is, however, subject to the following proviso, namely, that "an urban local council which had been holding cattle shows and fairs before 17th January, 1980 within the limits of its local area may continue holding such cattle shows and fairs and charge such fee from the people attending such shows or fairs etc.. As the bye-laws may provide".
7. It will be noticed that by section 101, an urban local council had the power to establish and maintain public markets for the sale of articles of food and drink and of animals within its local area but it should be obvious that the expression "Notwithstanding anything contained in subsection (1) of section 101" in subsection (1-A) of section 62 of the Ordinance has the effect of taking away that power. As regards section 51, clause (xxxix-a) and its provisos, they are not relevant to the inquiry with which we are concerned; learned counsel for the parties did not, therefore, call them to their aid in the interpretation of. Subsection (1-A) of section 62 of the Ordinance. The crucial question, therefore, is whether the powers of, an urban local council to hold cattle markets within its local area have been saved by section 106 of the Ordinance.
8. It will be observed that in subsection (1-A) of section 62 of the Ordinance, the prohibition is against the holding of cattle markets, private or otherwise. In that subsection the words "cattle shows" and "cattle fairs" do not occur at all. In section 106 of the Ordinance, all the three expressions, Mandis (markets), shows and fairs, have been used. By that section, subsection (1), an urban local council shall not hold cattle shows and fairs within the limits of its local area, but may hold Bakar Mandis for sale of cattle meant for slaughter and charge fee for cattle as the bye-laws may provide. The expression "Bakar Mandis" obviously means Bakar markets. The proviso to subsection (1) of section 106 enacts an exception to the general rule that "an urban local council shall not hold cattle shows and fairs within the limits of its local area", by providing that if an urban local council had been holding cattle shows and fairs before the 17th of January, 1980, within its local area, it may continue to hold such cattle shows and fairs. There should be no doubt that the express mention of "shows" and "fake and the omission of the word "market" in the proviso, to subsection (1) of section 106 cannot be without significance.
9.. The expression "market" is defined in section 3, clause (xix) of the Ordinance to mean "a place where persons assemble for the sale and purchase of meat, fish, poultry, fruit, vegetables or other eatables of food or for the sale and purchase of livestock or animals and includes any place which may from time be time be notified as a market". Significantly enough, however, thc expressions ''shows" and "fairs" have not been defined in the Ordinance. They are not in the. Language of the lawyers "terms of art" or what are, in popular parlance, known as "legal jargon" and must, therefore, be understood in their ordinary dictionary sense.
10. But to say that is not to take words in value, so to speak, and to attribute to them what is called the natural or ordinary meaning. For, few words in the English language have :a natural or ordinary meaning in the sense that they must be so read that their meaning is entirely independent of their context. (Lord Greene M.R. In Re Bidie v.. General Accidents, Fire and. Life Assurance Co. (1948) 2 All ER 995). As was said in A.G. v. Prince Angustus (1957) AC 436 (per Viscount Sirmonds), it must often; be difficult to say that any terms are clear and unambiguous until they 'have been studied in their context. "For words, particularly general words, cannot be read in isolation; their colour and contents are derived from their context." General words, it has been said, are like chameleons; they change their colour in different contexts and in the end, the meaning of a word must depend upon, its context.
11. There are two well-known rules of interpretation; the first is that the legislature, like any other author, must be taken to he consistent with itself and must, therefore, be presumed to have used the same words in the same sense and, in particular, in the same section or subsection. From this rule stems the second rule, namely, that different words are intended to have different meanings.
12. Learned counsel for thefirst respondent referred to the -Oxford English. Dictionary;. There, the word "fair" is stated to mean "A periodical gathering of buyers and sellers, in a place and at a time ordained by charter or statute or by ancient custom. (In many cases fairs are restored to for pleasure-seeking as well as for business; and in. England they sometimes survive merely as gatherings for pleasure)". He also cited Mahboob Yar Khan, etc. Municipal Committee, Mian Channu, etc. (PLD 1975 Lah. 748). In that case the Municipal Committee, Mian Channu, earmarked a new place, distinct from the existing place where a cattle fair was held (for three days in a month), to permit daily sale and purchase of sheep and goats and imposed a new tax on sellers in the new Bakar Mandi. The imposition of this tax was challenged; the Municipal Committee relied upon an existing bye-law which provided that any' person who exposed cattle for sale at any "cattlc fair on which the. Committee has incurred-expenditure shall pay to the committee a fee at the rate of six pies per rupee on the sale price of each head of cattle so sold" and the question was whether this bye-law covered the imposition of tax on the sale and purchase of sheep and goats in the new Bakar Mandl It is significant to note that in the Punjab Municipal Act under which the said bye-law had been madc, the expression "market" was not defined and the said expression was included in the term "fair-. This was so observed at page 751 of the report. It was held that a "fair" conveys the same idea as a "market" which is generally a place set apart for a concourse of buyers and sellers held often enough to meet the daily or weekly needs of a locality, while the term "fair" is usually employed for a concourse of buyers and sellers, which arises once or upon few occasions only during the year. "Every fair is a market, but every market is not a fair". A market is generally held more frequently than a fair; and the, word "fair" is derived from the Latin word "ferries, which signifies a holiday and is marked by amusements, which are usually provided when fairs are held.
Consequently though a market is not the same thing as a fair, but a "fair" is nonetheless a C "market". It was held, therefore, that the expression "fair" as used in section 187 of the Punjab Municipal Act, 1911, "was comprehensive enough to include a market".
13. The distinction between this ease and the precedent case is clear; it is that in the Punjab Municipal Act, 1911, the Word "market" was not defined and under that Act the. Expression "market" was included, in the term "fair", whereas in the Ordinance, the expression "market" has been defined but the expressions "fair" and "show" have not been defined.
14. As has been seen, in section 106 all the three expressions, market, fair and - show, have been used and the inference must be that the law-maker intended the three expressions to be understood in different senses. Rohs been seen that in its ordinary dictionary meaning also a "fair" includes some side shows and amusements. It seems to me therefore, that in the context. Of sections 62 and 106 of the Ordinance, a cattle market cannot be regarded as the same thing as a cattle fair. Section 100 itself provides a strong indication of the legislative intent that the expression ''market" was not intended to include the word "fair" and this is reinforced by a consideration of the 'very important fact that what section 64 subsection. (1-A) prohibit is the, holding. Of markets by urban councils, and what section 106(1) permits the urhan.Local councils to do is the holding of "shows" and "fairs" and not the holding of !Markets".
15. This view receives support from a case from Indian jurisdiction, namely, Mohinder Singh Sawhney v. State of Punjab- and others (AIR 1968 Punjab and Haryana 391) (To be fair to the learned counsel for the first respondent, it must be mentioned that this case was cited by him).
There, the writ petitioners had been carrying on the business of sale and purchase of cattle in markets organised by them for this purpose. They had taken land on lease from the municipalities or other local authorities for the purpose of holding these markets for the convenience of prospective buyers and sellers. The State Legislature enacted the Punjab Cattle Fair (Regulation)
Act, 1968, making sweeping powers containing prohibitions on cattle fairs and the question was whether a market organized for the sale and purchase of cattle was or was not covered by the popular concept of "fair", the contention being that every market could not be regarded as a fair. In that behalf reference was made to the meaning of the word "fair" as given in the Shorter Oxford English Dictionary, as also in the Stroud's Judicial Dictionary and it was noticed that "every fair, according to this definition, is a market but every market is not a fair"; it was emphasized that "the two franchises of fair and market are separate and distinct and of equal dignity and may co-exist in the same place on the same day". It was held that the act suffered from vagueness, for "if the fair is what is so regarded in dictionaries and legal parlance, a distinction has to be made between a.
Cattle market and a cattle fair and owing to the specific assertions made by the State Government in its return a subject cannot he left to the mercy and vagaries of the executive Government in the absence of any clear definition of 'fair".
16. All that remains to be seen is whether as provided by the proviso to subsection (I) of section 106, the first respondent had been holding cattle. Shows and cattle fairs before the 17th of January, 1980.
On behalf of the first respondent, a copy of the bye-laws dated the 8th of September, 1977, called the Bye-laws for Cattle Markets, has been placed on the record. There is. Then a writing (R-3) which shows that the cattle markets had been auctioned in the year 1979 by the Municipal Committee, Zafarwal. These documents are evidence of the fact that theCommittee had been holding market; they are, however, not evidence of the fact that the Committee had been holding cattle shows and cattle fairs within its limits before the 17th of January, 1980.
17. For these reasons, the petition is accepted and the first respondent, Town Committee, Zafarwal, is hereby directedto refrain from holding a cattle market, private or otherwise, within its local area.
Indeed, as the provisions of section 62 of the Ordinance are subject to -the provisions of section 106 thereof. This direction will not apply to the holding of "Bakar Mandis for sale of cattle meant for slaughter" and to the charging of such fee as the bye-laws may provide. The parties are, however, left to hear their own costs.,