GOLLA SATYANARAYANA Vs. REGIONAL TRANSPORT OFFICER KURNOOL

JUDGEMENT

(1.) .The petitioner asks for a writ of mandamus to compel the Regional Transport Officer, Kurnool, to consider his applications for a pucca permit as also atemporary permit on merits and according to law. The brief facts of the case are as follows : One Venkatalakshmamma was the owner of a lorry bearing No. APQ, 1770. While she was holding a public carrier permit in respect of it, proceedings were taken against her under section 60 of the Motor Vehicles Act, and her permit was first suspended and subsequently cancelled. Long after she surrendered her permit for formal cancellation by the R.T.A., she sold the lorry to the petitioner for valuable consideration. Subsequently, the petitioner applied for a pucca public carrier permit. As a measure of abundant caution and to provide against the possible delay in the grant of a pucca permit, he also applied for a temporary permit to the R.T.O. But neither of these applications was taken up for consideration by the R.T.A. or the R.T.O. What is more, when the application for transfer of the lorry was ordered in favour of the petitioner, it was recorded by the R.T.O. that for a period of one year, no permit will be issued to him. This order is dated 1st July, 1965. The petitioner is aggrieved by the situation created by this order of the R.T.O. and has come to this Court with the present Writ Petition. The case of the petitioner is that he is a stranger-purchaser of a lorry, the permit of which had been surrendered by the previous owner and cancelled by the R.T.A. Any punishment which might have been imposed by the R.T.A. on his vendor cannot now be visited upon him on the mere ground that he purchased the lorry. It is pointed out that no provision whatsoever exists in the Motor Vehicles Act or in any of the Rules made under it to justify the imposition of a disqualification on the petitioner to be the recipient of a permit for a period of one year. The petitioner's learned Counsel states that some executive instructions appear to have been issued by the Government to the R.T.A. on which the latter has sought to impose an unjustified disability on the petitioner. These executive instruction, it is contended, cannot be given effect to in such a manner as to run counter to the express statutory provisions in the Motor Vehicles Act and the Rules made thereunder. Further, it is rightly urged that the matter of granting a permit cannot be guided, controlled or restricted by mere executive instructions.

(2.) THE Motor Vehicles Act confers the power and the duty of issuing permits on specified transport authorities. THEy have to exercise that power and discharge that duty as independent statutory authorities without being influenced or controlled by any outside executive authority, however high it may be. This line of argument is further reinforced by pointing out that the grant or refusal of a permit to an applicant under the Motor Vehicles Act is essentially a quasi-judicial function which cannot be impeded or interfered with by the issue of executive instructions. I think these contentions are well-founded and do not allow of any escape or evasion. THErefore, the respondent has to proceed according to the relevant provisions of the Motor Vehicles Act and the Rules made thereunder without being trammelled by any executive instructions which the Government might have issued in the matter of the grant of permits. As I already stated, no section of the Motor Vehicles Act and no Rules made under it justifies the order of the respondent that for a period of one year, no permit shall be granted to the petitioner. It is, therefore, necessary that the respondent should be directed to consider the applications for permit made by the petitioner on merits and dispose of them according to the provisions of the Motor Vehicles Act and the Rules made thereunder, without being trammelled by any executive instructions in the matter of grant of permits. Directions issued.