BEHARILAL CHAURASIYA Vs. REGIONAL TRANSPORT AUTHORITY

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS is an application under Articles 226 and 227 of the Constitution of India by a person who holds stage carriage permits for certain routes including Chhatarpur-Damoh route within the jurisdiction of the Regional Transport Authority, rewa. The applicant seeks a writ of certiorari for quashing an order of the State Transport Authority passed on 26-11-1959 in the following circumstances.

(2.) ON 15-1-1958 one Ramnath Pande, claiming himself to be the Vice-President of Sagar Transport Development Company of Chhatarpur, tiled an application under Section 59 of the Motor Vehicles Act, 1939, before the Regional Transport Authority on behalf of his Company for the transfer of the Company's permit for Chhatarpur-Damoh route in favour of the petitioner Company, praying that the name of the petitioner Company be entered in permit No. 50 held by the Sagar Transport Development Company in respect of Chhatarpur-Damoh route. The petitioner agreed to this transfer of the permit. On 6-2-1958 the Regional Transport Authority made an order permitting the transfer of the permit. The opponent No. 3, Kishorilal, proprietor of Bundelkhand Motor Transport Company, then preferred a revision petition under Section 64-A of the Motor Vehicles Act, on 24-3-1958 before the State Transport Authority for setting aside on various grounds the order of the Regional Transport Authority sanctioning the transfer. After the filing of the revision petition, the State Transport Authority gave to the opponent No. 3 a notice to show cause why the revision petition should not be dismissed as barred by time. In response to this notice the said opponent stated that he had applied for a copy of the order of the Regional Transport Authority on 8-2-1958; that the copy of the order was supplied to him on 27-2-1958; and that, therefore, excluding the time taken by him in obtaining the copy of the order the revision petition was within time. The State Transport Authority did not pass any order as to whether the opponent No. 3 was entitled to claim that the time required for obtaining the copy of the order of the Regional Transport Authority should be excluded in computing the period of limitation prescribed by the proviso to Section 64-A of the Motor Vehicles Act. Apparently the State Transport Authority was satisfied with the cause shown, and treating the revision petition as within time proceeded to hear it on merits. The State Transport Authority took the view that the transfer of the permit was granted without any proper enquiry into the genuineness of transaction and that the application for transfer was not published as required by law and was also not disposed of in the same manner as an application for grant of a permit. Accordingly the State Transport Authority made an order remanding the case to the Regional Transport Authority with the direction to publish the application of the Sagar Transport Development Company for the transfer, for inviting the objections, and then to dispose of the petition after an enquiry into the question whether the transfer was genuine.

(3.) SHRI Dabir, learned counsel for the petitioner, first urged that under Section 3 of the Limitation Act and. Section 64-A of the Motor Vehicles Act the State Transport Authority was debarred from entertaining the revision petition as it was filed after the lapse of thirty days from the date of the order of the Regional Transport Authority and the opponent No. 3 was not entitled to claim that the time required for obtaining the copy of the order of the Regional Transport Authority should be excluded in computing the period of limitation. Learned counsel complained that the State Transport Authority altogether omitted to consider this question of limitation and suggested that the matter should be remitted to the State Transport Authority for determination of that question.