MUNICIPAL BOARD LUCKNOW Vs. SARDAR IQBAL SINGH

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is a special appeal against the decision of the learned Chief Justice made in an application for a writ of mandamus or any other appropriate writ or direction which may be issued to command the respondent, first, to issue certain licences applied for by the petitioners for plying rickshaws within the municipal limits of Lucknow and secondly to refrain from impounding certain rickshaws belonging to the petitioners found plying within the municipal limits for hire. The learned Chief Justice allowed the petition to the extent that he directed the issue of a writ commanding the Municipal Board to issue licences to the petitioners to ply rickshaws for hire within the municipal limits provided the petitioners fulfilled the requirements laid down in the relevant municipal bye-laws.

(2.) In order to appreciate the scope of the controversy that arose for decision in the writ petition it is necessary to state a few facts, The petitioners, who are the respondents in this appeal, were five in number and between them they owned a considerable number of rickshaws which they wished to ply for hire within the limits of the Lucknow Municipality. Under the bye-laws framed by the Municipal Board of Lucknow any person who wanted to ply a rickshaw within the Municipal limits had first to obtain a licence from the Municipal Board. The petitioners, therefore, made applications to the Municipal Board complying with the requirements laid down in the relevant bye-laws for the grant of licences. The Municipal Board was at the relevant period under the administration of an administrator for the Municipal Board itself had been superseded in the year 1948. This application for writ which was filed by the respondents was the culmination of a series of disputes that had been going on between the Municipal Board on the one hand and these rickshaw owners on the other from the year 1951. In 1950 the State Government introduced in Lucknow the State bus service which charged considerably lower fares than were charged by alternative forms of conveyance and as a result of this there was a lot of unemployment amongst tongawalas and rickshaw pullers with the result that there was a demand from those who had already been in the trade of transport by other means than buses that there should be no further increase in the number of tongas and rickshaws so as not to worsen the unemployment situation. On 17-1-1951, the number of rickshaw licences issued by the Municipal Board had reached the figure of 3152 and it appears that a decision had been taken by the Board that no fresh rickshaw licences were to be issued after the number of licences had reached the figure of 3250, and in case that figure was not reached by 31-1-1951, no further licences were to be issued after that date. It was stated before the learned Chief Justice at the time of hearing of the writ petition that although the last number of rickshaw licence Issued was 31.52 on 17-1-1951, yet in actuality the number of rickshaws plying on municipal licences at the time was in the neighbourhood of only 2400. The practical result of this fact was that in effect the number of rickshaws which were actually to ply within the Municipal limits was to be increased to the maximum number of about 2500.

(3.) The consequence of the decision of the Municipal Board not to issue further licences after 31st January, 1951, was that by the year 1953 a large number of applications for licences which had been made during that period remained pending and no decision was taken thereon, although the applicants kept on pressing the Municipal Board for the issue of licences to them. In September 1953 there appears to have been a change in the policy of the Municipal Board with the result that the Board directed that additional licences be issued provided the total number of rickshaws on the road did not at one time exceed 3250.