SEBASTIAN JOSEPH Vs. STATE OF KERALA AND ORS.

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The petitioners herein are husband and wife respectively. The petitioner in W.P.(C) No. 2783 of 2014, i.e. husband, is the promoter and director of M/s Chemmannur Jewellers (Kerala) Pvt. Ltd. having jewellery shops in different parts of the country. The said petitioner is also stated as a member of a Rifle club and was having national licence of two pistols. It is stated that the licence was being renewed from time to time upto the year 2010. Ext. P15 is the last renewal in this regard. Seeking to have the licence renewed further, Ext. P16 application was submitted before the third respondent. The said application came to be rejected as per Ext. P17 order dated 16.11.2012, which in turn is under challenge in this writ petition, pointing out that there is no statutory remedy, since no appeal is provided in respect of 'national licence', more so when the rejection was made as per the 'direction' given by the State Government as referred to in Ext. P17. Ext. P20 is the instruction given by the State Government in this regard.

(2.) Coming to W.P.(C) No. 29081 of 2014, the petitioner is the wife of the petitioner in other case and the licence was granted in respect of one SBML gun. The said licence came to be issued in the name of the petitioner in the year 2005. Before expiry of the validity period, the petitioner preferred Ext. P16 application for renewal before the 3rd respondent, but the same came to be rejected as per Ext. P17 by the 4th respondent. Though the petitioner sought to prefer appeal against the said order, the same did not turn to be fruitful. The specific case of the petitioner is that, in spite of the clear finding arrived at by the appellate authority that the petitioner's case was genuine, the appeal came to be disposed of simply ordering 'remand' as per Ext. P21. The grievance of the petitioner is that, the matter has been remanded quite unnecessarily, which has only given rise to another round of litigation from the beginning, necessitating calling for a fresh report from the Police. As matter of fact, report from the Police is to the effect that there is no imminent threat to the life of the petitioner and as such, remand cannot advance the case projected by the petitioner in any manner.

(3.) Heard the learned counsel for the petitioner as well as the learned Government Pleader at length.