The Doctrine of Pith and Substance

Pith means "true nature" or "essence" and substance means the essential nature underlying a phenomenon. Thus, the doctrine of pith and substance relates to finding out the true nature of a statute. This doctrine is widely used when deciding whether a state is within its rights to create a statute that involves a subject mentioned in Union List of the Constitution. The basic idea behind this principle is that an act or a provision created by the State is valid if the true nature of the act or the provision is about a subject that falls in the State list. The case of State of Maharashtra vs F N Balsara AIR 1951 illustrates this principle very nicely. In this case, the State of Maharashtra passed the Bombay Prohibition Act that prohibited the sale and storage of liquor. This affected the business of the appellant who used to import liquor. He challenged the act on the ground that import and export are the subjects that belong in Union list and state is incapable of making any laws regarding it. SC rejected this argument and held that the true nature of the act is the prohibition of alcohol in the state and this subject belongs to the State list. The court looks at the true character and nature of the act having regard to the purpose, scope, objective, and the effects of its provisions. Therefore, the fact that the act superficially touches on the import of alcohol does not make it invalid.


Thus, as held in State of W Bengal vs Kesoram Industries, 2004, the courts have to ignore the name given to the act by the legislature and must also disregard the incidental and superficial encroachments of the act and has to see where the impact of the legislation falls. It must then decide the constitutionality of the act.

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