RAJAN Vs. REGIONAL TRANSPORT AUTHORITY

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The petitioner is a stage carriage operator, who has obtained possession of a stage carriage having registration No. KL-7 AH/9945 from the registered owner of the same by a lease agreement. The petitioner then approached the respondent for replacing another stage carriage bearing Registration No. KL-24D/2881, running in the route Veliyam-Kottarakkara, in which, the petitioner has a regular permit. However, the said application was declined by Ext. P2 holding that the lease agreement, by which the vehicle was obtained has to be endorsed in the registration certificate. The learned counsel for the petitioner submits that there is no such provision for endorsing the lease agreement in the registration certificate. The learned Government Pleader points out S. 51 of the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988 (hereinafter referred to as "the Act" for short) and submits that no records were produced before the registering authority and that the registered owner of the vehicle is a third party.

(2.) With respect to the registered owner being a third party, the said issue is no longer res integra. This Court has in Raveendran v. R.T.O.,Kannur 1995 1 KerLT 126 held that, a person who obtains possession of a vehicle under a lease agreement is also entitled to operate the said vehicle in a permit issued to that person. The permit holder, hence, need not be the registered owner of the vehicle which is operated in a route on a valid permit. The next question is with respect to the provision under S. 51 of the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988. It has to be first noticed that S. 51 is not a mandatory provision, which requires that every agreement with respect to a vehicle has to be endorsed in the registration certificate. S. 51, in fact, provides any person having a lien over the vehicle to apply for an endorsement, so as to protect the said lien, over the vehicle and prohibiting the transfer of such vehicle by the registered owner without notice to such third party. For example, on a vehicle being purchased under a hire-purchase agreement, the financier would have a claim on the vehicle, till the hire amounts are fully repaid in such circumstance, on an application is made for registration of the motor vehicle, which is held under a hire-purchase, lease or hypothecation agreement, the registering authority is obliged to make an endorsement with respect to such hire-purchase, lease or hypothecation agreement. This is to ensure that no transfer of the vehicle is effected, without notice to the financier. S. 51 enables a third party, with whom the registered owner of a vehicle has entered into an agreement of hire-purchase, lease or hypothecation; with respect to the vehicle, to protect their interest. In the instant case, the registered owner himself has executed a lease agreement handing over possession of the vehicle to the petitioner herein. The petitioner herein has only a possessory claim over the vehicle only insofar as the terms of the lease agreement being satisfied. There is no requirement that the said lease agreement be endorsed under S. 51 of the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988, nor is it the legislative intent. The petitioner who has obtained the lease of the vehicle, from the registered owner, cannot transfer the registration of the vehicle in another's name. The very purpose of S. 51 is to endorse an agreement, whether it be hire-purchase, tease or hypothecation when the vehicle itself is purchased under such agreement. In such circumstance, Ext. P2 is set aside and the application filed by the petitioner is restored to the files of the respondent. The respondent is directed to consider the application afresh in accordance with the dictum laid down in M. Raveendran v. R.T.O., Kannur,1995 1 KerLT 126 within a period of three weeks' from the date of receipt of a certified copy of this judgment.