IN THE HIGH COURT OF KERALA AT ERNAKULAM
PRESENT:
THE HONOURABLE MR.JUSTICE THOTTATHIL B.RADHAKRISHNAN
&
THE HONOURABLE MR. JUSTICE DEVAN RAMACHANDRAN
TUESDAY, THE 10TH DAY OF JANUARY 2017/20TH POUSHA, 1938
WA.No. 707 of 2015
-------------------
JUDGMENT DATED 10-02-2015 IN WP(C) 32006/2014
.....
APPELLANT(S)/PETITIONERS:
------------------------
1. THE CLARIST MEDICAL TRUST OF THE S.H. PROVINCE,
ERNAKULAM, SANJOE HOSPITAL, PERUMBAVOOR - 683 542,
REPRESENTED BY ITS DIRECTOR SR.ANICE VALLIPPALM.
2. THE ADMINISTRATOR,
SANJOE HOSPITAL, PERUMBAVOOR - 683 542.
BY ADVS.SRI.V.M.KURIAN
SRI.MATHEW B. KURIAN
SRI.K.T.THOMAS
SRI.ISAC T.PAUL
RESPONDENT(S)/RESPONDENTS:
--------------------------
1. THE SECRETARY TO GOVERNMENT,
REVENUE DEPARTMENT, GOVERNMENT OF KERALA,
GOVERNMENT SECRETARIAT,
THIRUVANANTHAPURAM - 695 001.
2. THE TAHSILDAR,
KUNNATHUNAD TALUK, PERUMBAVOOR - 683 542.
BY SENIOR GOVERNMENT PLEADER SRI.MOHAMMED RAFEEQ
THIS WRIT APPEAL HAVING BEEN FINALLY HEARD ON 10-01-2017,
THE COURT ON THE SAME DAY DELIVERED THE FOLLOWING:
msv/
"CR"
THOTTATHIL B. RADHAKRISHNAN &
DEVAN RAMACHANDRAN, JJ.
=========================
W.A. No.707 of 2015
==========================
Dated this the 10th day of January, 2017
JUDGMENT
Devan Ramachandran, J.
In all its hues, chroma, variations and countenance, the
claim for exemption from payment of building tax under the
Kerala Building Tax Act, 1975 (for short, 'the Act') is
embedded on one provision, namely, section 3(1) therein.
Since all such exemptions has its hypostatis pinned on this
provision, a reading of the same becomes necessary in order
to travel into the ambit and bounds of the power and the same
is, therefore, extracted as under:
"3. Exemptions - (1) Nothing in this Act shall
apply to -
(a) buildings owned by the Government
of Kerala or the Government of India or any
local authority; and
(b) buildings used principally for
religious, charitable or educational purposes or
as factories or workshops [or cattle/pig/poultry
farms or poly houses].
Explanation I - For the purposes of this sub-
section, "charitable purpose" includes relief of
the poor and free medical relief."
W.A. No.707 of 2015
2
2. It is ineluctable from even an exfacie reading of the
Section that exemption can be claimed and granted under its
mandate only to buildings that are used principally for the
purposes itemized therein. Discernibly, the principal use of a
building for educational purpose would confer it worthy of
such exemption. The question here is, if an education
institution imparting teaching in Nursing gets itself attached
or affiliated to a hospital for its clinical requirements would
then obtain itself to be viewed as being used principally for
educational purposes. The affirmative assertion to the
questions is the contentions of the appellant in this appeal.
3. This appeal has been preferred by the appellants
against the judgment of the learned single Judge dismissing
the writ petition thereby repelling their claim for exemption,
on grounds afore-indicated, from payment of building tax for a
hospital being run by them.
4. We have heard Sri.V.M.Kurian, assisted by
Sri.Isac.T.Paul, the learned counsel for the appellants and the
learned Government Pleader appearing for the respondents.
5. The appellants claim that they are running a College
of Nursing as also a School of Nursing offering educational
courses leading to the degree of B.Sc.Nursing and
M.Sc.Nursing and that as is imperatively necessitated under
W.A. No.707 of 2015
3
the Regulations issued by the Nursing Council of India, they
have to have a 120-150 bedded parent/affiliated hospital for
each programme as an essential clinical facility. They assert
that they are thus obligated to run a hospital by name Sanjoe
Hospital which they maintain is the parent hospital as
required under the Regulations and that since the said
hospital provides clinical facilities to the College of Nursing
and the School of Nursing run by them, they are entitled to
exemption from payment of building tax for the hospital
building. This claim is obviously underpinned on the
postulation that the said hospital has been set up essentially
for educational purposes.
6. The College of Nursing and the School of Nursing run
by the appellants have been admittedly exempted from
payment of building tax under the provisions of the Act.
However, in the case of the hospital, such exemption was
denied by the Government and as a consequence, the
Tahsildar, being the assessing authority, issued an order
assessing the hospital building to tax under the Act. The writ
petition was filed by the appellants challenging the orders of
the Government denying exemption and that of the Tahsildar
assessing the hospital to tax. These orders were produced in
the writ petition as Exts.P9 and P10 respectively.
W.A. No.707 of 2015
4
7. The learned single Judge, however, dismissed the writ
petition holding that the appellants are not entitled to the
prayers made therein since the issue, as to whether a hospital
that is attached to a Medical College is entitled to claim
exemption from the charge of tax under the Act, has already
been answered to the contrary by a Division Bench of this
Court in the decision reported in Jubilee Mission Medical
College and Research Institute v. Government of Kerala
and others [2011 (4) KLT 106]. Obviously, since the law
that has been declared is that even a hospital, to which a
Medical College is attached can claim no exemption from
payment of building tax under the theorization that it is an
educational institution, a hospital to which a College of
Nursing or a School of Nursing is affiliated, would fare no
better and can make no greater claim. The learned singe
Judge also referred to the judgment of the Honourable
Supreme Court in S.H.Medical Centre Hospital v. State of
Kerala [2014 (1) KLT 316 (SC)] which is an authority for the
proposition that a hospital attached to a Medical College can
be treated as a building used for educational purposes only
when the medical relief offered in the said hospital is free of
cost. The learned single Judge, noticing these judgments,
W.A. No.707 of 2015
5
dismissed the writ petition and the appellants have now
chosen to impugn that judgment in this appeal.
8. From the pleadings on record and the submissions at
the Bar, we see that the appellants are running a College and
a School of Nursing by name Sanjoe School of Nursing and
Sanjoe College of Nursing with an annual intake of 56
students in both B.Sc. Nursing and M.Sc. Nursing courses.
They avouch and insist that the hospital run by them, namely,
Sanjoe Hospital is a parent hospital for the College and School
of Nursing and that it being an integral part of it, ought to be
deemed as an educational institution, thus, deserving
exemption from payment of building tax. It is vehemently
contended by the learned counsel for the appellants that the
principal use of the hospital building, being the
parent/affiliated hospital of the School and College of Nursing
is for educational purposes and thus authorised to exemption.
He says that the claim of the hospital for exemption from
building tax has its foundational brass-tacks on the fact that
the School and College of Nursing cannot exist without a
parent/affiliate hospital and since the hospital is a necessary
and unexpendable adjunct to the educational institutions, the
same should also be treated as part of it thus being entitled to
exemption under the Act. He pointedly refers to the
W.A. No.707 of 2015
6
Regulations of the Indian Nursing Council and says that the
school and college of nursing is constitutively mandated to
have a hospital with a particular intake so as to enable the
college to function and that for such reason, the hospital also
cannot have an existence apart from the Nursing School and
College.
9. We see that these submissions have its predication in
Regulation No.21 of Ext.P8 Regulations issued by the Indian
Nursing Council. We see that what is stated therein is that a
School of Nursing should have a parent/affiliated hospital with
a particular annual intake as an essential clinical facility for
the college. However, it does not say in any manner that
every Nursing College or School of Nursing should have a
hospital attached to it as an adjunct institution. What is meant
by this Regulation is that the School or College of Nursing
should be affiliated to a hospital which could be part of the
same management or of a separate management. If the
hospital belongs to the same management, obviously, it could
fall within the meaning of the word 'parent hospital' shown
therein or otherwise, it would then be taken as an affiliated
hospital. What is required, therefore, is only that the College
or School of Nursing should have an affiliation with a hospital,
answering the infrastructural requirements prescribed in the
W.A. No.707 of 2015
7
Regulations, so as to provide clinical facilities to the students.
This does not, however, in any manner go to mean that every
School or College of Nursing should have a hospital working
as a part of it. We are, therefore, unable to countenance the
submissions made by the learned counsel for the appellants.
10. We would assume that if at all a claim is laid out that
a hospital exists only for the purpose of a College or School of
Nursing, it would then have to be made manifest by the
asserter that the hospital caters solely to the purposes of
students of such School or College and that all the profits and
earnings from such hospital is being used solely for the
purposes of the School or College Nursing, perhaps even to
subsidise the eduction of the students. If this had been so,
then it could have been possibly maintained by the appellants
that they are not running the hospital for profit and that they
are, therefore, entitled to exemption in confirmity with the
judgment of the Honourable Supreme Court in S.H.Medical
Centre Hospital (supra). Perhaps, if the appellants had a
case that even though the hospital does not offer medical
relief free of cost but that all the amounts or at least all the
profits received from the hospital are put to use for the
educational institutions, then we would suspect that they
W.A. No.707 of 2015
8
could have possibly gained a better footing to claim
exemption. In any event of the matter, the case of the
appellants is quite to the contrary. They admit that the
hospital does not offer free medical relief nor that it is meant
only for the purpose of the School and College of Nursing.
They do not admit in any manner that all the profits from the
hospital are used for the educational institutions or that the
hospital is being run solely for the purposes of the educational
institutions. If that be so, obviously, this is a case where
issues raised by the appellants are squarely covered by the
precedents mentioned above.
In such event of the matter, we are in full concurrence
with the judgment of the learned single Judge and see no
reason to deviate from it in any manner whatsoever. We,
therefore, dismiss this writ appeal.
Sd/- THOTTATHIL B. RADHAKRISHNAN
JUDGE
Sd/- DEVAN RAMACHANDRAN
stu JUDGE
//True copy//
P.A to Judge.
PRESENT:
THE HONOURABLE MR.JUSTICE THOTTATHIL B.RADHAKRISHNAN
&
THE HONOURABLE MR. JUSTICE DEVAN RAMACHANDRAN
TUESDAY, THE 10TH DAY OF JANUARY 2017/20TH POUSHA, 1938
WA.No. 707 of 2015
-------------------
JUDGMENT DATED 10-02-2015 IN WP(C) 32006/2014
.....
APPELLANT(S)/PETITIONERS:
------------------------
1. THE CLARIST MEDICAL TRUST OF THE S.H. PROVINCE,
ERNAKULAM, SANJOE HOSPITAL, PERUMBAVOOR - 683 542,
REPRESENTED BY ITS DIRECTOR SR.ANICE VALLIPPALM.
2. THE ADMINISTRATOR,
SANJOE HOSPITAL, PERUMBAVOOR - 683 542.
BY ADVS.SRI.V.M.KURIAN
SRI.MATHEW B. KURIAN
SRI.K.T.THOMAS
SRI.ISAC T.PAUL
RESPONDENT(S)/RESPONDENTS:
--------------------------
1. THE SECRETARY TO GOVERNMENT,
REVENUE DEPARTMENT, GOVERNMENT OF KERALA,
GOVERNMENT SECRETARIAT,
THIRUVANANTHAPURAM - 695 001.
2. THE TAHSILDAR,
KUNNATHUNAD TALUK, PERUMBAVOOR - 683 542.
BY SENIOR GOVERNMENT PLEADER SRI.MOHAMMED RAFEEQ
THIS WRIT APPEAL HAVING BEEN FINALLY HEARD ON 10-01-2017,
THE COURT ON THE SAME DAY DELIVERED THE FOLLOWING:
msv/
"CR"
THOTTATHIL B. RADHAKRISHNAN &
DEVAN RAMACHANDRAN, JJ.
=========================
W.A. No.707 of 2015
==========================
Dated this the 10th day of January, 2017
JUDGMENT
Devan Ramachandran, J.
In all its hues, chroma, variations and countenance, the
claim for exemption from payment of building tax under the
Kerala Building Tax Act, 1975 (for short, 'the Act') is
embedded on one provision, namely, section 3(1) therein.
Since all such exemptions has its hypostatis pinned on this
provision, a reading of the same becomes necessary in order
to travel into the ambit and bounds of the power and the same
is, therefore, extracted as under:
"3. Exemptions - (1) Nothing in this Act shall
apply to -
(a) buildings owned by the Government
of Kerala or the Government of India or any
local authority; and
(b) buildings used principally for
religious, charitable or educational purposes or
as factories or workshops [or cattle/pig/poultry
farms or poly houses].
Explanation I - For the purposes of this sub-
section, "charitable purpose" includes relief of
the poor and free medical relief."
W.A. No.707 of 2015
2
2. It is ineluctable from even an exfacie reading of the
Section that exemption can be claimed and granted under its
mandate only to buildings that are used principally for the
purposes itemized therein. Discernibly, the principal use of a
building for educational purpose would confer it worthy of
such exemption. The question here is, if an education
institution imparting teaching in Nursing gets itself attached
or affiliated to a hospital for its clinical requirements would
then obtain itself to be viewed as being used principally for
educational purposes. The affirmative assertion to the
questions is the contentions of the appellant in this appeal.
3. This appeal has been preferred by the appellants
against the judgment of the learned single Judge dismissing
the writ petition thereby repelling their claim for exemption,
on grounds afore-indicated, from payment of building tax for a
hospital being run by them.
4. We have heard Sri.V.M.Kurian, assisted by
Sri.Isac.T.Paul, the learned counsel for the appellants and the
learned Government Pleader appearing for the respondents.
5. The appellants claim that they are running a College
of Nursing as also a School of Nursing offering educational
courses leading to the degree of B.Sc.Nursing and
M.Sc.Nursing and that as is imperatively necessitated under
W.A. No.707 of 2015
3
the Regulations issued by the Nursing Council of India, they
have to have a 120-150 bedded parent/affiliated hospital for
each programme as an essential clinical facility. They assert
that they are thus obligated to run a hospital by name Sanjoe
Hospital which they maintain is the parent hospital as
required under the Regulations and that since the said
hospital provides clinical facilities to the College of Nursing
and the School of Nursing run by them, they are entitled to
exemption from payment of building tax for the hospital
building. This claim is obviously underpinned on the
postulation that the said hospital has been set up essentially
for educational purposes.
6. The College of Nursing and the School of Nursing run
by the appellants have been admittedly exempted from
payment of building tax under the provisions of the Act.
However, in the case of the hospital, such exemption was
denied by the Government and as a consequence, the
Tahsildar, being the assessing authority, issued an order
assessing the hospital building to tax under the Act. The writ
petition was filed by the appellants challenging the orders of
the Government denying exemption and that of the Tahsildar
assessing the hospital to tax. These orders were produced in
the writ petition as Exts.P9 and P10 respectively.
W.A. No.707 of 2015
4
7. The learned single Judge, however, dismissed the writ
petition holding that the appellants are not entitled to the
prayers made therein since the issue, as to whether a hospital
that is attached to a Medical College is entitled to claim
exemption from the charge of tax under the Act, has already
been answered to the contrary by a Division Bench of this
Court in the decision reported in Jubilee Mission Medical
College and Research Institute v. Government of Kerala
and others [2011 (4) KLT 106]. Obviously, since the law
that has been declared is that even a hospital, to which a
Medical College is attached can claim no exemption from
payment of building tax under the theorization that it is an
educational institution, a hospital to which a College of
Nursing or a School of Nursing is affiliated, would fare no
better and can make no greater claim. The learned singe
Judge also referred to the judgment of the Honourable
Supreme Court in S.H.Medical Centre Hospital v. State of
Kerala [2014 (1) KLT 316 (SC)] which is an authority for the
proposition that a hospital attached to a Medical College can
be treated as a building used for educational purposes only
when the medical relief offered in the said hospital is free of
cost. The learned single Judge, noticing these judgments,
W.A. No.707 of 2015
5
dismissed the writ petition and the appellants have now
chosen to impugn that judgment in this appeal.
8. From the pleadings on record and the submissions at
the Bar, we see that the appellants are running a College and
a School of Nursing by name Sanjoe School of Nursing and
Sanjoe College of Nursing with an annual intake of 56
students in both B.Sc. Nursing and M.Sc. Nursing courses.
They avouch and insist that the hospital run by them, namely,
Sanjoe Hospital is a parent hospital for the College and School
of Nursing and that it being an integral part of it, ought to be
deemed as an educational institution, thus, deserving
exemption from payment of building tax. It is vehemently
contended by the learned counsel for the appellants that the
principal use of the hospital building, being the
parent/affiliated hospital of the School and College of Nursing
is for educational purposes and thus authorised to exemption.
He says that the claim of the hospital for exemption from
building tax has its foundational brass-tacks on the fact that
the School and College of Nursing cannot exist without a
parent/affiliate hospital and since the hospital is a necessary
and unexpendable adjunct to the educational institutions, the
same should also be treated as part of it thus being entitled to
exemption under the Act. He pointedly refers to the
W.A. No.707 of 2015
6
Regulations of the Indian Nursing Council and says that the
school and college of nursing is constitutively mandated to
have a hospital with a particular intake so as to enable the
college to function and that for such reason, the hospital also
cannot have an existence apart from the Nursing School and
College.
9. We see that these submissions have its predication in
Regulation No.21 of Ext.P8 Regulations issued by the Indian
Nursing Council. We see that what is stated therein is that a
School of Nursing should have a parent/affiliated hospital with
a particular annual intake as an essential clinical facility for
the college. However, it does not say in any manner that
every Nursing College or School of Nursing should have a
hospital attached to it as an adjunct institution. What is meant
by this Regulation is that the School or College of Nursing
should be affiliated to a hospital which could be part of the
same management or of a separate management. If the
hospital belongs to the same management, obviously, it could
fall within the meaning of the word 'parent hospital' shown
therein or otherwise, it would then be taken as an affiliated
hospital. What is required, therefore, is only that the College
or School of Nursing should have an affiliation with a hospital,
answering the infrastructural requirements prescribed in the
W.A. No.707 of 2015
7
Regulations, so as to provide clinical facilities to the students.
This does not, however, in any manner go to mean that every
School or College of Nursing should have a hospital working
as a part of it. We are, therefore, unable to countenance the
submissions made by the learned counsel for the appellants.
10. We would assume that if at all a claim is laid out that
a hospital exists only for the purpose of a College or School of
Nursing, it would then have to be made manifest by the
asserter that the hospital caters solely to the purposes of
students of such School or College and that all the profits and
earnings from such hospital is being used solely for the
purposes of the School or College Nursing, perhaps even to
subsidise the eduction of the students. If this had been so,
then it could have been possibly maintained by the appellants
that they are not running the hospital for profit and that they
are, therefore, entitled to exemption in confirmity with the
judgment of the Honourable Supreme Court in S.H.Medical
Centre Hospital (supra). Perhaps, if the appellants had a
case that even though the hospital does not offer medical
relief free of cost but that all the amounts or at least all the
profits received from the hospital are put to use for the
educational institutions, then we would suspect that they
W.A. No.707 of 2015
8
could have possibly gained a better footing to claim
exemption. In any event of the matter, the case of the
appellants is quite to the contrary. They admit that the
hospital does not offer free medical relief nor that it is meant
only for the purpose of the School and College of Nursing.
They do not admit in any manner that all the profits from the
hospital are used for the educational institutions or that the
hospital is being run solely for the purposes of the educational
institutions. If that be so, obviously, this is a case where
issues raised by the appellants are squarely covered by the
precedents mentioned above.
In such event of the matter, we are in full concurrence
with the judgment of the learned single Judge and see no
reason to deviate from it in any manner whatsoever. We,
therefore, dismiss this writ appeal.
Sd/- THOTTATHIL B. RADHAKRISHNAN
JUDGE
Sd/- DEVAN RAMACHANDRAN
stu JUDGE
//True copy//
P.A to Judge.
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