A SRIAMAREDDY Vs. DISTRICT MANAGER TELEPHONES HYDERABAD

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Four petitioners who were given telephone connections beyond the local area have assailed in the Writ petition the demand for an increased tariff from them on the basis of the revision of the local area from a date anterior to the date notice of the revision of local area.

(2.) The Ist petitioner herein was given telephone connection on 31-5-1967. this connection fell one kilo-metre beyond the local area and, therefore, additional tariff of Rs. 18 per quarter was levied, It is on that basis that he accepted the connection. The tariff was revised from Rs. 18.00 to Rs. 30.00 per kilo-meter on 20-7-1967. For the payment of this tariff also, he has no objection. But the local area was revised with effect from 16-8-1967, according to which, the telephone connection given to the petitioner fell 7,4 kilometers beyond the local area. Then subsequently on 6-2-1968 a notice demanding a sum of Rupees 1,454/- per annum was issued to him on the basis of this revised local area and further calling upon him to execute an agreement guaranteeing that he would take the connection for a minimum period of five years. So far as the case of petitioner 2 and 4 is concerned, it is almost identical except a to the distance between the local area and the connection and the consequent variation in the amount demanded. The 3rd petitioners telephone connection was originally within the local area, but as per the revised local area, it fails 4.8 kilometers beyond the local area and hence an extra demand at the rate of Rs.30/3- per kilometers per annum was made.

(3.) The petitioner contend that the local area having been once fixed and an agreement having been entered into between the petitioners and the department the respondents had no jurisdiction to revise the same. Secondly, even if it is held that there is a power of revision vested in the authorities, the same could not be revised without notice to them and lastly, it is contended that, in any even, this revision of the local area could not be given retrospective effect. The respondents admit that no notice was given to the petitioner before the local area was revised. But they contend that they have the power to revise without giving such notice, for nowhere it is laid down by the Indian Telegraph Act, 1885 (Act No. XIII of 1885) and the Rules made thereunder that notice should be given to the subscribers before the local area is revised.