Prabhu Ram and Others vs The State Transport Commissioner and Others

N.K. Sodhi, J.—Petitioners are transporters holding regular stage carriage permits on Behror-Narnaul route. This is an Inter-State route a part of which lies in the State of Rajasthan and the remaining in the State of Haryana. These permits were granted by the Regional Transport Authority, Alwar on 21.1.1997 and are valid for five years. The permits could be valid in the State of Haryana only if they are countersigned by the transport authorities of that State. Section 88 of the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988 (for short ''the Act'') provides that the provisions relating to the grant, revocation and suspension of counter-signatures of permit provided that it shall not be necessary to follow the procedure laid down in Section 80 of the Act for the grant of counter-signatures of permits, where they are granted in any one State are required to the countersigned by another State as a result of any agreement arrived at between the States after complying with the requirements of Sub-section (5) of Section 88. It is common case of the parties that there is an Inter-State agreement between the States of Haryana and Rajasthan regarding fixing the number of permits proposed to be granted or counter-signed by each State in respect of different routes including Bohror-Narnaul route. The draft of this agreement was published by the Haryana Government on 22.4.1997 for inviting objections. Clause 9 of the draft agreement reads as under :-

"9. With the coming into force of this agreement, all previous bilateral agreements in the matter of road transport between the State of Rajasthan and the State of Haryana shall stand rescinded and all the counter-signatures obtained by each State with regard to State Carriage permits shall stand cancelled automatically. For grant of counter-signatures fresh recommendation will be issued by both the States as per this reciprocal agreement."

The draft agreement was finalised on 9.7.1997 and the same was published in the Haryana Government Gazette on 15.7.1997. The final agreement as published does not contain Clause 9 of the draft agreement. It will be seen that in terms of the final agreement the requirement of fresh recommendation for the counter-signatures which was proposed in the draft agreement has been done away with. According to the agreement the State of Haryana is required to counter-sign 14 permits with an equal number of return trips on the route in question. It has countersigned only three permits so far and eleven permits have still to be countersigned. The petitioners alongwith some others applied to the State Transport Commissioner for the grant of countersignatures and as per letter dated 3.9.1997 their case has been recommended to the Regional Transport Authority, Alwar for issuing fresh recommendations for countersigning the permits. It is against this action of the respondents that the present petition has been filed under Article 226 of the Constitution.

In the written statement filed by the respondents, it is pleaded that the writ petition is pre-mature, because fresh recommendation from the Rajasthan Transport Authority has yet to come and that the request of the petitioners for countersignatures has not yet been considered. It is further pleaded that it is only on receipt of the fresh recommendations that their permits could be countersigned under the reciprocal agreement.

The only argument advanced by the learned counsel for the petitioners is that the requirement of fresh recommendation from the granting authority for the purpose of countersigning the permits having been dispensed with in the final agreement arrived at between the two States, the State Transport Commissioner should not have asked for a fresh recommendation and that since the applications of the petitioners fall within the limit of permits which the State of Haryana could countersign, the State Transport Commissioner should have countersigned them. There is merit in this contention. The draft agreement which was published by the Haryana Government on 22.4.1997 has a clause requiring fresh recommendation from the issuing authority before the permit could be counter-signed on reciprocal basis. This requirement was not incorporated in the final operative agreement as Clause 9 of the draft stood deleted therefrom. Thus, no fresh recommendation was necessary and that if the permits fall within, the requisite number which the State of Haryana could counter-sign, then the application for the grant of counter-signatures had to be granted. It is not in dispute that in the matter of grant of countersignatures the State of Haryana adopts the policy of ''first come first serve''. Admittedly the Haryana Government is to countersign 14 permits on this route on the basis of the reciprocal agreement. Three permits out of these have been countersigned. The petitioner who are four in number alongwith six others have filed their applications with the Transport Commissioner for the grant of countersignatures. In all they come to ten. They are, therefore, within the number prescribed for the State of Haryana to grant the countersignatures. This being so, there is no reason why the State Transport Commissioner, Haryana should not grant the countersignatures to the petitioners and other applicants and instead ask the Regional Transport Authority, Alwar to send fresh recommendations. Fresh recommendations, as already observed, are not required in terms of the agreement and, therefore, the action of the respondents in asking the Regional Transport Authority, Alwar to send the same cannot be sustained. The communication dated 3.9.1997 sent by the State Transport Commissioner in this regard (Annexure P-3 with the writ petition) is quashed and the State Transport Commissioner directed to countersign the permits of the petitioners and other applicants. The writ petition accordingly stands allowed with no order as to costs.