JAVARE GOWDA Vs. REGIONAL TRANSPORT OFFICER MANDYA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) in this petition, the petitioner has, inter alia, sought for the issue of a writ of mandamus directing the respondent to grant the application made by him for alteration of the seating capacity of his motor vehicle under Section 32 (1) of the motor vehicles a'ct, 1939 ('the act' for short). 2 the facts of the case in brief are as follow :- the petitioner is the owner of a taxi cab bearing registration No. Klm. 3315, which is a diesel trucker. The seating capacity of the taxi cab has been 6+1. He applied to the regional transport officer, mandya, under Section 32 (1) of the act praying for alteration of the seating capacity of the vehicle from 6+1 to 5+1. The application was rejected as per endorsement dated 25-8-87. The endorsement reads : Sri Javaregowda registered owner of motor vehicle No. Klm. 3315 is hereby informed that his application for alteration of seating capacity 6 + 1 to 5+1 is rejected on the following ground : 1. The Vehicle klm. 3315 is adopted to carry more number of passengers. Reducing seating capacity would result in innecessary waste of valuable space and facility.

(2.) prior approval or sanction wasnot accorded for such reduction of seating capacity by the r.t.a., which granted the permit. In the absence of such approval permit will be liable for cancellation and vehicle is liable be re-classified as motor car and application put in is not bona fied and substantial is made with an intention to circumvent and defeat to provision of law. As can be seen from the Order, the reason given by the authority for rejecting the application was that reducing seating capacity would result in unnecessary waste of valuable space and facility and that the granting of the request was not bona fide and was intended to circumvent and defeat the provision of law. Questioning the legality of the said decision, the petitioner presented this petition.

(3.) as there has been divergence of opinion regarding the scope of Section 32of the Act, the learned judge before whom the matter came up for hearing has referred the writ petition to division bench under Section 9 of the Karnataka High Court Act.