- (1.) The petitioner - All Rajasthan Bus Owners' Association has filed this writ petition through its Secretary Shri Mehar M. Siddique resident of Jodhpur and challenged the impugned notification dated 21-12-1989 (Annex. 2) issued by the Govt. of Rajasthan and it is prayed that the same may be declared ultra vires to the notification dated 12-6-1989 issued by the Central Government. It is also prayed that the State Govt. may be prohibited in implementing the impugned notification dated 21-12-1989. It is further prayed that the State Govt. be directed to register the vehicles in accordance with the procedure as laid down by the Central Govt. vide notification dated 12-6-1989 issued under the powers conferred under Section 41(6) of New Motor Vehicles Act, 1988. This petition has been filed a public interest litigation petition. Before coming to the merits of the case and the contentions raised by learned counsel Miss Padmini Rathore on behalf of the petitioner, I must state that there is no public interest involved in this matter. In fact such petitions are against the public interest, therefore, the matter was required to be dismissed only on this ground without going into the merits of the case.
(2.) Coming to the merits of the case, learned Counsel Miss Rathore for the petitioner vehemently submitted that the State Govt. had no powers under Section 41(6) of the New Motor Vehicles Act, 1988 (for short the Act, 1988). She submitted that the powers vest only to the Central Govt. to issue any notification and the Central Govt. in exercise of powers under Section 64 of the Act issued the notification dated 12-6-1989. Thereafter, the State Govt. issued the impugned notification dated 21-12-1989 (Annex. 2) which is ultra vires to the earlier notification issued by the Central Govt. on 12-6-89. It may be stated that the petitioner has not thought it fit to join Central Govt. as a party respondent though the petitioner claims that it is only the prerogative Central Govt. to issue such notification and no one else. Therefore, in absence of necessary party, this petition is required to be dismissed. Be that as it may, the Central Govt. issued a noti-fication dated 12-6-1989 in exercise of powers under Section 41(6) of the Act, 1988 and allotted the States and Union Territories the group of letters specified in corresponding entries in column No. 2 of the table and stated that the registration mark for each State and Union Territory has to be followed by the Code number of registering authority to be allotted by the State Govt. and the administrator of the Union Territories respectively. It should not exceed four figures to be used as registration mark. It has also been mentioned in the notification dated 12-6-89 that where the four figures referred to in para 1 reaches the next series with Alphabet 'A' followed by not more than four figures and, thereafter, with alphabet 'B' followed by not more than four figures and so on until all the alphabets, excluding 'I' and 'O' are exhausted. Pursuant to that notification issued by the Central Govt. the State of Rajasthan issued the notification dated 21-12-1989 (Annex. 2) and assigned various Code numbers to various registering authorities. Jodhpur District is assigned Code No. 19.
(3.) According to the petitioner-association the impugned notification is contrary to the notification dated 12-6-1989 issued by Central Govt. The contention of the petitioner is that the State Govt. has not any statutory powers to issue such notification (Annex. 2). This contention has no force. The Central Govt. has issued the notification in exercise of powers under Section 41(6) of the Act, 1988 and, thereafter, it is up to the States to issue further notification, accordingly, the State of Rajasthan has also issued the impugned notification dated 21-12-1989 (Annex. 2). On behalf of the State Govt., it was vehemently submitted that they are purely administrative powers of the State and the State has to regulate the same after the Central Govt. issued the notification. It was submitted that no right of the petitioner much less fundamental right has been violated. It was also submitted that this Court should curb such false and frivilous litigation which are filed in the name of public interest litigation, which are infact private against the public interest as the valuable time of the Court is wasted in such matters. There is lot of force and substance in the submission made on behalf of the State Govt. It is also submitted that similar notifications have been issued by the other States also. It was also pointed out that though the impugned notification was issued on 21-12-1989 and acted and implemented upon by all including the member of the petitioner association, this petition came to be filed only on 22-2-1992 after more than a period of one year. Till then no grievance was made by anyone. It was also pointed out that though the stay petition was filed with this petition but no stay order was granted and ultimately the stay petition was dismissed as not pressed by this Court (V. G. Palshikar, J.) on 28-7-1995.;