The Supreme Court has held that there cannot be a recovery of cess solely on the basis of the report of the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) without any statutory adjudication process. It is well settled that when a statute requires a thing to be done in a particular manner, it is to be done in that manner alone. The Court also held that the mere existence of an alternate remedy in the form of arbitration was not a bar to exercise writ jurisdiction as the impugned acts were patently illegal.
