Electricity duty on generators: LHC restains power department from taking measures against SKMCH

Lahore High Court (LHC) has restrained Punjab Irrigation and Power Department from taking any coercive measures against administration of Shaukat Khanum Memorial Cancer Hospital (SKMCH) for recovery of electricity duty. The court issued these directions in a petition of SKMCH filed through its Chief Executive Officer, Dr Faisal Sultan.
The petitioner submitted that to fulfil their electricity requirements they installed three generators of capacity 2000 KVA, 1400 KVA and 1350 KVA as the hospital needed uninterrupted electricity supply. He said on January 25, 2010 an electricity inspector of the department issued them a notice that for using generators, they must pay electricity duty.
He said through the notice, they also required them to submit a report about energy generation, distribution and self consumption so that they could make assessment for limit of electricity duty. They replied the notice asking them that they did not fall under the charging provision. But instead of exempting them from the duty they rejected their response and started using coercive measures for recovery of the duty.
The petitioner said they were not a profitable organisation and hence did not fall under the 5th schedule of the Finance Act 1964. He said the respondents were illegally adopting coercive measures against them for recovery of electricity duty. He therefore prayed the court to declare the notice for recovery of the electricity duty as illegal and stop them from using coercive measures against them.