In a relief to a Popular Tamil Actor, Vijay, the Madras High Court stayed the Single Bench Judgment imposing Rs. 1 lakh for challenging the levy of entry tax on import of Rolls Royce car.
The appellant, Vijay has challenged the Single Judge Bench Judgement wherein a petition seeking a direction to forbear authorities from demanding/collecting entry tax on his new Rolls Royce Ghost imported from England was dismissed. While rejecting the plea of the actor, Justice SM Subramaniam also imposed a cost of 1 lakh rupees.
Criticising the “reel heroes” for hesitating to pay taxes, the Single Bench observed that “the petitioner / Actor having large scale fan groups and those fans are seeing the Actors as real heroes. In the State of Tamil Nadu, Cine Heroes rosed as rulers of the State and therefore, the people are under the impression that they are the real heroes. Thus, they are not expected to behave like reel heroes. Tax evasion is to be construed as an anti-national habit, attitude and mindset and unconstitutional.”
Advocate Vijay Narayan on behalf of the appellant contended that the learned judge has cast aspersions on me (Actor Vijay) by labelling him as an anti-national and has cast aspersions on the whole acting community. Out of 500 other similar petitions involving luxury cars, some even costlier, the case of Vijay cannot be picked out alone.
Mr. Narayan further added that when the order was dictated in open court, it was a standard order of dismissal like the ones passed in the other similar cases, but when the judgment copy was uploaded, the petitioner was “shocked” to see the derogatory remarks.
Mr. Narayan said that “the adverse remarks created a negative publicity. This can be hurtful to any person”.
A division Judge Bench of Justice S Duraiswamy and Justice R Hemalatha while staying the order of the Single bench directed Vijay to pay the balance 80% entry tax within a week of demand challan issued by the tax department and on the request of Mr. Narayan, the bench directed the department to raise the demand within a week.
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