CONDITIONAL LEGISLATION

Meaning
 Frequently, the Legislature enacts a law
conditionally leaving it to the Executive to decide as
to when it will come into operation.
 Its prospective operation or territorial extension or
both may depend upon the fixation of the date of
commencement of the Act by the government
through a notification to this effect.
 Its operative effect may be in relation to time or
place r both depending on the fulfilment of the
condition.
 The condition is laid down by the Legislature but the
Government is given the authority and discretion to
determine and to decide whether the event statutorily
contemplated, has happened or not or whether the
contemplated expediency on which the operation of the
enactment depends has arisen or not. The operation of
the law follows the fulfilment of the condition.
 May be the date of commencement be entirely left to
the Government. It was laid down that-
“ It shall come into force on such date as the Central
Government by notification in the Official Gazette
appoint and different dates may be appointed for
different provisions of the Act.”
 “The aim of all legislatures is to project their minds as
far as possible into the future, and to provide in terms
as general as possible for all contingencies likely to
arise in the application of the law.
 But it is not possible to provide specifically for all
cases and, therefore legislation from the very earliest
times and particularly in modern times, has taken the
form of conditional legislation, leaving it to some
specified authority to determine-
(i) The circumstances in which the law shall be applied,
or
(ii) What its operation shall be extended to, or
(iii) The particular class of persons or goods to which it
shall be applied.”
 In conditional legislation, law is full and complete
when it leaves the legislative chamber, but the
operation of law is made de­pendent upon the
fulfillment of a condition, and what is delegated to an
outside body is the authority to determine, by the
exercise of its own judgment, whether or not the
condition has been fulfilled.
 It would be a case of conditional legislation where the legislature
empowers an authority-

(a) To extend the duration of an Act within the maximum period fixed
by the legislature;
(b) To extend the existing laws to any territory;
(c) To determine the extent to which limits fixed by law should be
applied;
(d) To determine the time of applying law;
(e) To bring into force a special law if the Government deems fit or is
satisfied to do so in view of any contemplated situation.
(f) To bring an Ordinance into force if the State Government is satisfied
about existence of an emergency and declares it to be in force in the
State. The Ordinance provides for the es­tablishment of the special
courts the time and within the limits considered necessary by the State
Government.
 The doctrine of Conditional Legislation was laid
down in the case of Empress v. Abdullah, 1878.
 Their Lordship have observed that where plenary
powers of Legislation exist as to particular subjects
in an Imperial or in a Provincial Legislation they
may be well exercised , either absolutely or
conditionally.
Other cases-
 King Emperor v. Banwari Lal Sharma, 1945.
 Banglore Weaving and Spinning Mills v. Banglore
Corporations, 1962.
 State of Bombay v. Narottam Das, 1951.
 Jatinder Nath Gupta v. Province of Bihar, 1949.
 Inder Singh v. State of Rajasthan, 1957.
 In the case of Hamdard Dawakhana v. UOI 1960, the
court observed that “the distinction between the
conditional and delegated legislation is that- in the
former, the delegate’s power is that of determining
when a legislative declared rule of conduct shall
become effective and the latter involves delegation of
rule-making power which may be exercised
constitutionally by the administrative agent. This
means legislature after have laid down the broad
principles of its policy in the legislation can leave
details to be supplied by the administrative authority.”
“ Under delegated legislation, the delegate supplements
the legislation by supplying details within the limits
prescribed by the statute, on the other hand, in the case
of conditional legislation, the power of legislation is
exercised by Legislature conditionally leaving to the
discretion of an external authority, the time and manner
of carrying its legislation into effect as also the
determination of area to which it is extended.”