PRYAG CHOUDHARY Vs. K RAMAN

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE petitioner has filed this application under Article 226 of the Constitution of India praying that an order of the Appeal Board, under the Motor Vehicles Act, dated the 17th June. 1969 (Annexure 2), so far as it affected the petitioner, be quashed by a writ of certiorari. By that order, passed on appeal, an order granting stage carriage permit to the petitioner by the South Bihar Regional Transport Authority for the route Jehanabad-Kurtha has been set aside, on the ground that the petitioner was a minor. It may be mentioned at this stage, that, out of the route, a distance of two miles from Jehanabad has been nationalised and, therefore, Bihar State Road Transport Corporation had objected to the grant of a permit over the nationalised route also, and this objection had been overruled by the Road Transport Authority on the ground that the nationalised portion was a negligible distance covering the municipal limits only. As against this matter Bihar Road Transport Corporation has filed C. W. J. C. 1085 of 1969, which will be dealt with separately.

(2.) THE relevant facts are these: It is stated that Jehanabad-Kurtha route covering a distance of 14. miles had been advertised for grant of permanent stage carriage permit (two trips up and down) and applications were invited for the same. Eleven applicants had applied for one vacancy on the route. It is stated that South Bihar Regional Transport Authority, Patna, considered the respective claims of the parties and granted permit to the petitioner and a copy of the order has been annexed as Annexure 1. Against this order respondent No. 3 and Bihar State Road Transport Corporation filed appeals before the Appeal Board of the State Transport Authority, and for the reasons given in the order (Annexure 2), the Appeal Board granted permit to respondent No. 3, after reversing the order granting permit to the petitioner. THE circumstances under which the petitioner did not get any relief under Section 64-A of the Motor Vehicles (Bihar Amendment) Act, 1949 have been mentioned in paragraph 6 of the writ application and hence this application has been filed for the relief mentioned above. As indicated earlier, the order granting permit to the petitioner has been reversed on the ground that he was a minor and it is contended in the writ application that a new point had been allowed to be taken by respondent No. 3 at the appellate stage, and that the order incorporated in Annexure 2 is wholly illegal. It appears from the record that in this writ application, the petitioner's father has filed his own Vakalatnama as guardian of the petitioner and the parties have proceeded in this case on the footing that the writ petitioner is still a minor.

(3.) ON the question in issue in this case, it is a curious feature of the Motor Vehicles Act, 1939 (Act 4 of 1939)--hereinafter to be called the Act--that it is nowhere stated that a minor is not entitled to any permit. Age limits have been laid down in connection with the driving of motor vehicles in Section 4 of the Act, which reads thus:--