King of Pop Micheal Jackson died nearly two years ago but his concert performed 15 years back continues to be embroiled in a controversy with the Bombay high court today observing that the then Shiv Sena-BJP government had not "applied its mind" before granting entertainment tax exemption to the concert.
A division bench of Justice DK Deshmukh and Justice Anoop Mohta was hearing a petition filed by Mumbai Grahak Panchayat alleging that there had been irregularities in granting exemption on entertainment tax on a show performed by Micheal Jackson in 1996 in Mumbai.
"Prima facie we (court) think that there has been no application of mind by the then state government while granting tax exemption to the concert. The only reason given by the government for exemption was that the concert was for charitable cause which it clearly was not," Justice Deshmukh said.
According to the petition, the event management company Wizcraft along with a trust Shiv Udyog Samiti founded by Raj Thackeray had misrepresented facts to the state government following which the then minister for cultural affairs Pramod Navalkar had granted exemption.
"You (Wizcraft) gave the application seeking exemption directly to the chambers of the Minister who passed an order in your favour within a day without even conducting a proper enquiry. No one knew what the exact nature of the concert was," the court remarked.
The bench while reserving its order on the petition till Wednesday said it was inclined to direct the state government to reconsider Wizcraft's application filed in 1996 seeking entertainment tax exemption afresh.
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