- (1.) THIS is a writ petition under Article 226 of the Constitution of India on behalf of the petitioner Mangilal praying that the order of the Appellate Tribunal of the State transport Authority, Rajasthan, Jaipur, respondent No. 1 dated the 14th of June, 1954 cancelling, under Section 60 (d) of the Indian Motor Vehicles Act, the permit for plying a stage carriage be set aside and respondent No. 1 and the Regional transport Authority Jodhpur Division Jodhpur respondent No. 2 be prohibited from interfering with the plying of bus of the petitioner.
(2.) THE circumstances under which respondent No. 1 ordered the cancellation of the permit of the petitioner are as hereunder:-
(3.) THE Regional Transport Authority, Jodh-pur, published a notification in rajasthan Raj-patra dated the 4th of October. 1952 inviting applications for permits for plying stage carriage on Makrana Parbasar-Bassi route for three years the petitioner's application was rejected by the Regional Transport Authority and the petitioner went in appeal to respondent No. 1 which by its order dated the 4th of September, 1953, accepted the appeal of the petitioner and granted him permit for plying stage carriage on the above mentioned route. The petitioner had a bus which was registered in Nagpur District and its registered number was RJS. 131. The petitioner applied to the respondent No. a to issue the permit for plying the bus No. RJS. 131 but the respondent No. 2 refused to issue the permit to the petitioner on the ground that the certificate of registration' of that vehicle showed that the year of manufacture of the vehicle was 1948, he could not be granted a permit for plying the bus. It presumably relies on some departmental instructions which make it incumbent on a new applicant to own and possess a vehicle which has been manufactured within three years of the date of obtaining the permit. Thereafter, according to the petitioner, he made an application to the Registering Authority, Jaipur, that the engine of his vehicle RJS 131 had gone out of order and he had replaced it by another engine, which was of 1950 model. He prayed for necessary correction to be made in the registration certificate in respect of new engine. In fact he made an application for the assignment of new mark and new registration certificate. The Registration Authority, Jaipur PS-signed new registration mark RJL 3173 "to the vehicle previously registered as RJS 131 on the 2lst February, 1954 and the registration certificate contained the year of manufacture of the vehicle as 1950. Having obtained the new registration mark and the new certificate of registration from the Registering Authority, Jaipur, the petitioner again applied to respondent no 2 to issue a permit and produced the new certificate of registration before that authority. Respondent No. 2 issued a permit to the petitioner as prayed for, and the petitioner started plying the bus from the 10th of April, 1954. One Sultan Singh made a complaint to respondent No. 2, which inter alia contained, that the petitioner had no bus of the year 1950 or of a later date and he in obtaining the permit had played a fraud by producing the certificate of registration of the same bus for which permit had been refused earlier. Respondent No. 2 directed the petitioner to produce the document relating to vehicle No. RJL 3173, he did not produce the same, but his statement was recorded and respondent No. 2 came to the conclusion that the act of the petitioner in obtaining the permit amounted to fraud. Under these circumstances, he recommended to respondent no. 1 that the permit issued to the petitioner be cancelled under Section 60 (d) of the Indian Motor Vehicles Act. Respondent No. 1 ordered on the 15th of June, 1954 that the permit obtained by the petitioner be cancelled on the ground that the petitioner had obtained the permit fraudulently and by misrepresenting facts.;