RAM CHANDRA PALAI Vs. STATE OF ORISSA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) These petitions under Art. 32 of the Constitution are filed by the owners of Stage Carriage Services plying their buses on several routes in the districts of the State of Orissa impugning the provisions of Orissa Act XXXVI of 1947 and Orissa Act I of 1949 as violative of their fundamental rights. They raise a common question of law and can be disposed of by one judgment.

(2.) The State of Orissa embarked upon a scheme of Nationalised State Transport and, as a first step towards, it, enacted and Act styled the Orissa Motor Vehicles (Regulation of Stage Carriage and Public Carrier's Services) Act, 1947 (Orissa Act XXXVI of 1947), which modified the provisions of the Motor Vehicles Carriage and Public Carrier's Services in the Province of Orissa. This Act envisaged the formation of a Joint-Stock Company in which the Central and the Provincial Governments shall together have controlling interests for providing in stages or in one stage a more efficient administration of the entire stage carriage and public carrier's services in the Province of Orissa. Such a Company was to be authorized to run carriage and public carrier's services in the Province of Orissa to the exclusion of all other persons in the routes and areas over which it extended its activities, and with that end in view the provisions of the Motor Vehicles Act, 1939, were modified as therein specified. Section 4 of the Act provided that the Provincial Government may, if they think fit, by notification direct that the powers conferred by the Motor Vehicles Act, 1939, on a Provincial Transport Authority or Regional Transport Authority shall be held in abeyance with respect to the issue, renewal, suspension or transfer of permits for stage carriage services and public carrier's services. Such a notification was to be effective according to the directions either in the whole of the Province or in any specified area or in respect of any specified route or routes. On the issue of such a notification the above mentioned powers conferred on the Provincial Transport Authority or the Regional Transport Authority were to be held in abeyance and all permits issued, renewed or transferred by them were to become inoperative and the Provincial Government alone was to have the power to issue or renew permits or to grant temporary permits or to suspend or to transfer permits for stage carriage services and public carrier's services.

(3.) Whilst the State of Orissa was examining the question of the formation of such a Company, the merger of feudatory States of Orissa with the Province of Orissa took place on the 1st January 1948. Some of these Durbars had their own transport services and these were taken over by the State Government of Orissa. Orissa was then divided into 5 zones for the purpose of proper development of road transport, viz., Sambalpur, Keonjhar, Koraput, Ganjam and Cuttack zones. It was decided by the Government to nationalise passenger service transport in the first three zones to be run departmentally based on the nucleus services taken over from the feudatory States which had merged. In order to give effect to this decision, the Orissa Motor Vehicles (Amendment) Act, 1948 (Orissa Act I of 1949) was enacted which further amended the Motor Vehicles Act, 1939, in the manner therein specified. Section 1(3) of that Act provided that the remaining provisions of the Act shall come into force in such specified areas of the district or districts as the Provincial Government may by notification from time to time appoint. The Provincial Government may also by notification withdraw the remaining provisions of the Act from any specified areas. It was further provided that on and from the date when the remaining provisions of the Act came into force in any specified areas, the provisions of Orissa Act XXXVI of 1947 shall be repealed in respect of the said specified areas and when the remaining provisions of the Act were withdrawn from any specified areas, the provisions of Orissa Act XXXVI of 1947 shall be deemed to be revived in the said specified areas from the date of publication of the notification of withdrawal.