ANJAIAH Vs. R T O GUNTUR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is an application for the issue of a writ of prohibition restraining the Regional Transport Officer, Guntur from enforcing against the petitioner his order dated 3oth October, 1953. The petitioner is a Motor-transport operator with a stage-carriage permit on the route from Tenali to Cherukupalli. The bus which he runs on the route is registered as M. D. G. 1669. On 19th September, 1953 during one of its journeys on the route, it was checked by the Motor Vehicles Inspector and according to him there was an over-load of 9 persons. The respondent then directed the suspension of the petitioner's permit for a period of six weeks from the date when alternative arrangements could be made.. The petitioner preferred an appeal to the Central Road Traffic Board and thereafter a revision petition to the State Government in vain. At the time whten the over-load was discovered, the permit in favour of the petitioner, which was in force, was then due to expire on 6-3-1954. The petitioner applied in time for the renewal of the permit. The permit was accordingly renewed with effect from 7-3-1954 till 6-3-1956. The order of the Government dismissing the revision petition was made on aand March, 1954. During the period of the pendency of his appeal to the Central Road Traffic Board and his revision before the Government, the operation of the order of suspension was stayed. The result is that the order of suspension is now sought to be enforced as against the renewed permit. The petitioner contends that the order suspending his previous permit cannot be enforced against the permit under which he is now running the bus.

(2.) The petitioner relies on an unreported decision of one of us, a short-note of which appears in 1951- II-M. L J. N. R. G. 59(1). That was a cage where an order suspending a temporary permit granted under Sec. 62 was sought to be put into effect against a regular permit subsequently issued. It was decicted therein that it could not be done, the reason being that the penalty for non-compliance with the conditions of one permit could not be exacted in relation to another permit. The learned Government Pleader points out that there is a difference between a regular permit superseding a temporary one and a second permit which is merely a renewal of the earlier one. He refers to the language of the rule 183 of the Madras Motor Vehicles Rules which provides that the application for the renewal of a permit shall be made \ in Form FRA. He also refers to the Form PSP which is the form prescribed for a permit in respect of a particular stage-carriage. Under the heading ' renewals" below the body of the form, is found the following entry : '' This permit is hereby renewed up to the day of 10 subject to the following further conditions : Date 19 Secretary, Transport Authority." He contends that a renewed permit is really a continuation of the old permit and hence a breach of a condition in the old permit can be punished by an order of suspension enforceable against the renewed permit. Reference may be made in this connection to the provision for the renewal of a permit made in sub-section (2) of Sec. 58 of the Motor Vehicles Act which runs thus :

(3.) The words "renewed" and "renewal" occuring in Sub-section (2) of Sec. 58 are, in our opinion, clearly not words of art. Indeed, Mr. Seshachalapathi for the Government does not dispute it. There can hardly be any analogy between a renewed lease or even a renewed promissory note and a renewed permit within the meaning of this Act. The word 'renewal" in our opinion is merely used to enable the Government to give preference to the previous permit holders who are quite properly to be treated on a different footing from new applicants. There is no right of renewal as such and when a permit is renewed, there is no right either, on the part of the permit-holder to insist upon the continuance of the old terms. It would be undesirable that there should be any such restrictions upon the right of the authorities to grant the permit to anybody they choose, or subject to any conditions that they think it to be necessary to impose, provided that they are acting all the time in the public interest and subject to the provisions of the Motor Vehicles Act and the Rules made thereunder. These words must therefore be interpreted in their popular sense. Sec. 60 of the Act, which empowers the transport authority to cancel or suspend a permit, may also be read in this connection.