Bombay HC stays 100x hike in licence fees for orchestra bars – Times of India

MUMBAI: In an interim order that comes as a relief to bar owners, the Bombay high court has stayed a December 2019 notification issued by the Mumbai police commissioner that hiked annual premise licence fees for bars with orchestra permits. The increase in this category was from Rs 2,000 to Rs 2 lakh, and the notification was with retrospective effect from January 1, 2018, reports Swati Deshpande.
“The demand is excessive, disproportionate and pays no heed at all to well-known pandemic and lockdown circumstances, ones that have even resulted in judicial orders extending periods of limitation and even ordering the temporary cessation of municipal actions against illegal structures,” said the high court in its order.
The order, by a bench of Justices Gautam Patel and Madhav Jamdar, was passed on November 17 on a petition by Baywatch Restaurant and Bar owner Anitha Shetty, who challenged the hike notification issued in December 2019 by the police commissioner. The bar is located in Dadar (E).
The bench said, “We are also not even remotely satisfied that a retrospective demand like this can be made in law. This is a question that we will address at a later stage.”