- (1.) THIS is an application by Dalichand Kalal under Art. 226 of the Consti-tution praying for a writ of certiorary, prohibition and mandamus against the State Transport Authority (Appellate Authority), Jaipur quashing the order made by that Authority on the 21st December, 1955.
(2.) THE application is a long one, and it is not necessary to set it out in detail. Suffice it to say that the brief facts are that the Regional Transport Authority, Udaipur invited applications for permits on the Udaipur-Rikhabdev Dungarpur route as permits of four stage-carriages on that route were expiring, Those four persons, whose permits were expiring, naturally applied for renewal, while a number of other persons applied for being considered for grant of permits on this route. THE Regional Transport (Authority considered all these matters on the 12th and 13th of Nov. , 1954 and decided to renew the four permits, and refused the applications of all new applicants. THE relevant part of their order is as follows - "it was felt that the buses operating on these routes at the moment are adequate to cater the traffic. THEy are serving the public satisfactorily under the management of the Association, and there is no complaint from the public or any body on record. Moreover, there is no increase in the number of buses over this route. " There was an appeal by Laxmi Bus Service to the State Transport Authority against the order refusing permit to it. That appeal was allow by the State Transport Authority, and a permit was granted to Messrs Laxmi Bus Service on the 21st of Dec. , 1955, and the basis of the appellate Authority's order is in these words - "after going through the whole record of the case and hearing the learned counsel and Secretary, R. T. A. , we think that if more buses are placed upon the rout it will lead to public convenience. " The present application is directed against this order of the State Transport Authority, and three main grounds are being urged before us, namely - (1) The copy of the Regional Transport Authority's resolution dated 12/13th November, 1924, which was filed along with the appeal, did not bear eight annas' court-fee stamp as required by law, and therefore the appeal was not competent, and should have been dismissed by the Appellate Authority: (2) Under rule 108, sub-rule (2), the dates of hearing have to be fixed by the Appellate Authority, and as this was not done, all proceedings before the appellate Authority were bad; (3) There was no justification on merits for the State Transport Authority to grant one more permit in the face of the opinion of the Regional Transport Authority, and in particular to take into account certain documents produced by Messrs Laxmi Bus Service against the provisions of rule 109 of the Rajasthan Motor Vehicles Rules of 1951. The application has been opposed on behalf of Messrs Laxmi Bus Service and the State Transport Authority Jaipur, and it is urged on their behalf that there is no substance in the three points raised by the applicant. We shall proceed to consider these points one by one. So far as the first point is concerned, there is no doubt that the stamp required on the copy of the resolution, which was filed along with the appeal, was not there when the appeal was filed. A long dispute seems to have gone on before the appellate Authority whether that document required stamp or not. Eventually, it was conceded that the document did require an eight-annas stamp, and the stamp was affixed to it with the permission of the Appellate Authority. It has been urged that there is no provision in the Motor Vehicles Rules for permitting affixation of stamp afterwards, and thus treating the appeal as properly filed on the date on which it was originally filed. We are of opinion that this is a mere technicality, and sec. 28 of the Court Fees Act will cover such a case. There is no force, therefore, in this contention. The second point that is being urged is that the date of hearing should be fixed by the Chairman of the Appellate Authority as rule 108 (b) of the Rajasthan Motor Vehicles Rules 1951 requires that the Appellate Authority is to appoint a time and place for the hearing of the appeal. In the first place, rule 108 (b) only applies to the first date of hearing after the presentation of the appeal. In the second place, we are of opinion that fixation of a date is more or less a ministerial act, and can be done by the officers working under the Appellate Authority, and it will be presumed unless the chairman and members object to the date fixed, that the date is fixed with their consent. There is, therefore, nothing in this technicality which has been raised on behalf of the applicant, and we overrule this contention also. The third point that has been urged is that certain documents were admitted by the Appellate Authority beyond the time allowed by rule 109 of the Rajasthan Motor Vehicles Rules 1951. It is not necessary for present purposes to go into the question whether the Appellate Authority could accept documents even after the time allowed by rule 109,though we see no objection in their doing so, provided the other side has been given opportunity to meet them. The basic facts of this case are however, simple. The Regional Transport Authority considered that 14 buses which were plying on the route (permits of four out of which were being renewed) were adequate to cater for the needs of the public. Their order does not show on what basis they came to this conclusion. The State Transport Authority thought that once more bus could be added to the 14 already playing, and it would be for the convenience of the public. Their order also does not show why they thought so. Both of them have given their subjective opinion on this point. The difference in the number is only one, and we think that we should not interfere, in these circumstances, with the order of the higher of the two bodies. It would have been a different matter if the parties had placed material before the transport authorities on the basis of which we could find some objective test which would, on the fact of it, nullify the grant of one more permit under the provisions of sec. 47 of the Motor Vehicles Act. In this case, no facts were apparently pieced before the two authorities, and, in these circumstances, even though the orders of the two Authorities are based merely on their subjective opinion, we do not think it worth while to interfere. We, therefore, dismiss the application with one set of costs to the opposite party. . ;