IKRAM AHMAD GULABKHAN Vs. REGIONAL TRANSPORT AUTHORITY

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE petitioner, who is bus operator, challenges the validity of model condition attached to his regular stage carriage permit.

(2.) THE petitioner, alongwith some other applicants, was granted regular stage carriage permit over route Tikamgarh-Nowgaon Via Dhajarai, Baldeogarh, Khargapur, Palera, Kasoli, which is 91 kms. in length, vide order dated 19.4.91 by R.T.A. Sagar (Annexure 'A'). The R.T.A. in the said order imposed model condition that the permit holder shall operate the route by 1990 or a later model. It is this condition relating to model of the vehicle which is challenged in this writ petition. It is also averred that the petitioner has no alternative remedy since the Presiding Officer of S.T.A.T. has retired and the post is still lying vacant.

(3.) WE find absolutely no merit in the contentions raised. It is too late in the day to contend that imposition of model condition is de horse any statutory provision. As back as in the year 1964, this Court while interpreting the words "stage carriage of a specified description" occurring in the main provision of Sub-section (3) of Section 48 of the Motor Vehicles Act, 1939 had observed that the words "stage carriages of a specified description" were wide enough to give to the Regional Transport Authority power to attach to a permit a model condition namely, that the service shall be run with a stage carriage of a particular year of manufacture. See Sheelchand v. ST.A. Authority in . The above provision of Section 48(3) has been replaced by exactly similar provision of Section 72(2) of the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988. There is therefore no change in law and hence if imposition of model condition could be traced to statutory power under the old Act, as it could, it is traceable to statutory power even under the present Act.