Non Sequitur

2. The expression is often used in legal decisions to
discard, declare irrelevant or unrelated an argument used to establish a
particular fact or a legal position. The fact that a statement or conclusion of
facts or law is non-sequitur does not necessarily imply that the same is
incorrect. What it implies is that the same does not logically follow from the
premise from which it is arrived at. In other words the premise and the
conclusions are unrelated having no cause and effect relationship.

3. A legal decision is a combined effect of finding of
relevant facts — direct and inferential — and application of appropriate legal
principles to the problems disclosed by those facts. Finding of a particular
factual situation from a bundle of facts, not all leading to the same legal
situation, is one area where the conclusion can be termed non-sequitur
i.e., not arising from the facts presented. In Alembic Chemical Works Co.
Ltd., v. CIT Gujarat, 1989 AIR 1913, where the issue was whether payment to
a Japanese company for supply of requisite technical know-how was revenue
expenditure being laid out for existing business or capital expenditure on a new
business, the High Court on reading of various clauses of the agreement
concluded that initiation and exploitation of the new process as per the
know-how brought in their wake a new venture requiring an altogether new plant
and, accordingly, held it capital expenditure. In appeal the Supreme Court
basing their decision on terms of the same agreement held the conclusion drawn
by the High Court as non-sequitur.

4. Doctrine of ‘Precedent’ makes the decisions of higher
judicial authorities binding on all lower judicial bodies operating within the
jurisdiction. Doctrine of ‘stare decisis requires Courts to stand by
their earlier decisions, unless a review becomes necessary for reasons of
compelling contemporary social conditions or when additional reasons exist
pointing to a wrong precedent having been created. Legal decisions favouring the
stand of the concerned parties are, therefore, cited to support the views
advocated by them. But, as held by the Supreme Court in State of Orissa v.
Mohd Illiyas, (2006) ISCC 275, reliance on such decisions without going into
the factual background of the cases before it, is clearly impermissible. A
decision is a precedent on its own facts. It is an authority for what it
actually decides and no more. Their Lordships quoted with approval the
observations of Earl of Halsbury L. C in Leathem (1901) AC 495 (HL) to the
effect that every judgment must be read as applicable to the particular facts of
the case in which such expressions are found. When arguments are based on the
earlier legal decisions of the same or higher judicial authority without due
consideration of the factual background in which those decision were made, the
resulting decision becomes non-sequitur as the conclusion therein does
not follow the cited cases. In Wajid Ali Abid Ali v. CIT Lucknow, 1987
AIR 2074 where the Court was to give meaning to the word ‘cease’ in the context
of a partner ceasing to be a partner and large number of cases were cited, the
Court for the above-stated reason did not consider it necessary to be bogged by
these decisions, holding “These (cases) though throwing light, however, are
non-sequitur for the issue before us”.

5. In Azadi Bachao Andolan v. UOI reported in 263 ITR
706 where the Supreme Court was to adjudicate on the legality of the Circular
No. 789, dated 13-4-2000 making certificate of residence issued by Mauritius
Authorities as sufficient proof of residence and beneficial ownership, the
argument about the inconsistency of the impugned Circular with the provisions of
the Act, was found to be total non-sequitur for the simple reason that
the impugned Circular No. 789 was a Circular within the meaning of S. 90 and,
therefore, should have legal consequences contemplated by Ss.(2) of S. 90 and
not any other provision of the Act. In other words, the Circular, it was held,
shall prevail even if inconsistent with the provisions of Income-tax Act 1961,
insofar as the parties covered by the provisions of DTAC are concerned, as the
convention overrides the provisions of the Act. The consistency of what is
contained in the Circular, therefore, needs to follow the provisions of S. 90
which alone prevails.

6. Many a time, an order is supported by several reasons out
of which some may be found to be of no relevance to the determination of issue
involved. Mention of such reasons is held non-sequitur even if the
conclusions are upheld in appeal. In State of Maharashtra v. Chandrabhan
Tale, 1983 AIR 803, the Supreme Court was to decide on the legality of the
second proviso to Rule 151(1)(ii)(b) of the Bombay Civil Service Rules 1959
which provided for award of subsistence allowance at rupees one per month to a
government servant who is convicted and sentenced to imprisonment and whose
appeal against the conviction is pending. Concurring with his fellow Judge who
held that rule as illegal, inter alia, for reason of ludicrously low
amount of subsistence allowance, Chinnappa Reddy, J considered the observations
about the nature of public employment opportunity made by the fellow judge as
non-sequitur and held that “Though the view that public employment
opportunily is national wealth in which all citizens are equally entitled to
share and that no class of people can monopolise public employment in the guise
of efficiency or other ground, is correct, it is non-sequitur“.

He did not favour the right to equal opportunity to public
employment to be treated as a new form of private property and saw no reason to
introduce a new concept of property so as to bring in its wake the vestiges of
the doctrine of leissez faire and create, in the name of efficiency, a
new oligarchy.