MAYILVAHANAM MOTOR SERVICE Vs. STATE OF KERALA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE petitioners are operators within the meaning of that term as defined in S. 2 (b) of the Kerala Motor Vehicles (Taxation of passengers and Goods) Act, 1963 (hereinafter referred to as Act 25 of 1963 ). THE petitioners challenge the validity of the Motor Vehicles (Kerala Third amendment) Act, 1971, (for short, Act 34 of 1971) in its entirety. THE petitioner in O. P. No. 2513 of 1971 also challenges the validity of the Kerala motor Vehicles (Taxation of Passengers and Goods) (Amendment) Act, 1970, (for short, Act 18 of 1971) in its entirety though the petitioner In O. P. No. 2340 of 1971 confines his attack to the validity of S. 6 thereof.

(2.) HESE two petitions form two of a batch that we heard together. Even this batch only represents a small number of the totality of the petitions pending before this Court challenging the validity of Acts 18 and 34 of 1971. It is agreed before us that the pleadings in tHESE two petitions exhaust the pleadings in the batch of cases that have been argued before us and further that the cases in that batch are representative of the entirety of cases on the subject and we will, therefore, in dealing with the matters involved, confine our attention to the pleadings. in tHESE petitions.

(3.) THE rate of fare that was payable in the Malabar area of the State was that fixed by notification, G O. (MS) 565/home dated 5-3-1954, issued by the Government of Madras fixing 3. 90 paise THE fare was fixed in the notification as annas and pies. per mile, and providing a minimum of 31 paise the fare was fixed in the notification as annas and pies for distances less than 8 miles. In the Travancore-Cochin area of the State, the fare was that fixed by notification dated 23-5-1952 by the Travancore-Cochin Government, also providing a rate of 3. 90 paise THE fare was fixed in the notification as annas and pies. per mile and the minimum fare being 19 paise THE fare was fixed in the notification as annas and pies. Thus it will be seen that the fare per mile was the same in both the areas of the State though the minimum was different. THE Kerala Government by notification dated 15-4-1958 eliminated this difference in the minimum fare and a uniform minimum rate of 16 paise was fixed this notification also slightly altered the fare per mile by fixing it at 4 paise per mile. For the sake of completeness, we may also refer to the notification dated 14-2-1961 which reduced the minimum from 16 paise to 10 paise.