INDO CANADIAN TRANSPORT COMPANY Vs. UNION OF INDIA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The petitioners in these 13 writ petitions claim that the States of Punjab and Haryana are not entitled to charge any taxes except those sanctioned by the Ministry of Surface Transport vide letter dated August 30, 1993 from the tourist transport operators. Learned counsel for the parties have referred to the facts in Civil Writ Petition No. 12119 of 1996. These may be briefly noticed.

(2.) The petitioner-M/s. Indo-Canadian Transport Company entered into an agreement with the Punjab Tourism Development Corporation for providing "modern transport facilities to the tourists visiting Punjab and in particular for taking groups from I.G.I. (Indira Gandhi International Airport), New Delhi to Amritsar and back". By virtue of this agreement, the petitioner had undertaken to get the logo of the Punjab Tourism painted on its buses and to ply on the aforesaid route. After the agreement, the petitioner claims to have purchased four buses.

(3.) The petitioner avers that in the year 1992, the Transport Development Council of India had held a meeting and recommended that "an appropriate scheme may be worked out for operation of tourist cabs/coaches on the basis of an All India Permit". For this purpose, a committee of the State Transport Secretaries was formed and on the basis of its recommendations, a scheme called 'The Motor Vehicles (All India Permit for Tourist Transport Operators) Rules, 1993' was finally notified on August 10, 1993. It was recorded that the State Governments "had agreed that apart from the Home State Tax, the composite fee be charged from the permit holders" at the fixed rates. For "Omni Coach of 14-35 seats", a composite fee of Rs. 12,000/- per quarter per State (other than the Home State) was fixed. A copy of the communication sent by the Ministry of Surface Transport on August 30, 1993 has been produced as Annexure P-2 with the writ petition. In paragraph 3 of this letter, it was stated as under :-