Judgment

R. S. PATHAK, J. :- The petitioners in these writ petitions ply cycle rickshaws in Amritsar which they hire for the day from the owners of those vehicles. Most of the petitioners belong to other districts, of Punjab and also come from the neighbouring States of Jammu and Kashmir,. Himachal Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh. They carry on that activity for about eight months in the year and then return to the regions to which they belong. They observe this practice year after year. For the hire of cycle rickshaws they pay the owners a certain sum for the day, retaining .the balance of the days income to themselves. It is alleged by the petitioners that they are not in a position to purchase any cycle rickshaws and that unless they hire the vehicles they cannot carry on that activity.

2. Over the years there has been considerable agitation in. the State of Punjab against the practice of the owners of cycle rickshaws hiring people of the poorest stratum in society to ply the, cycle rickshaws for public passenger traffic and to charge them for each days use of the vehicles. It is said that oppressed by their poverty the petitioners and those similarly placed are obliged to enter into this Arrangement with cycle rickshaw owners, who through such exploitation are able quite often to obtain an unduly handsome return on the paltry investment made in the purchase of the cycle rickshaws. The agitation led the State Government to consider measures for enabling the pullers of cycle rickshaws to extricate themselves from such exploitation, and it was thought desirable that the cycle rickshaw puffers should own their own vehicles, and the State Government should arrange interest free loans for them to enable them to purchase cycle rickshaws. With this object in mind, the Punjab Legislature enacted the Punjab Cycle Rickshaws (Regulation of Licence) Act, 1976. S. 3 provided :

"Licence , for cycle-rickshaws.- (1) Notwithstanding anything contained to the contrary in the Punjab Municipal Act, 1911, or any rule or order or bye-law made thereunder or any other law for the time being in force, no owner of a cycle-rickshaw shall be granted any licence in respect of his cycle- rickshaw not his licence shall be renewed by any municipal authority after the commencement of this Act unless the cycle-rickshaw is to be plied by such owner himself."

And S. 5 declared :-

"Penalties.- (1) Any person who is found to be, in possession of a cycle-rickshaw without a licence conforming to the provisions of this Act or plies or causes it to be plied by a person without a valid drivers licence issued under any law for the time. being in force or plies or causes to be plied a cycle-rickshaw not meant to be plied for hire without painting the body thereof in yellow shall be punishable with imprisonment which may extend to three months."

3. The petitioners considered that the, enactment had resulted in making their conditions much worse for whereas formerly they could at least ply the cycle-rickshaws on hiring them from the owners for a sum they were unable to do so now, specially as they did not have the funds, nor possessed the arrangements for obtaining a loan for the purpose. It was pointed out that as the petitioners were not permanent residents of Amritsar, no one was prepared to stand surety for the amount which they sought to borrow from the Banks, that inasmuch as the Banks at Amritsar had been unable to recover about eighty per cent of the amount loaned by them they had decided to deny this facility to cycle-rickshaw pullers, and that, therefore, they were not in a position to purchase cycle-rickshaw. In the circumstances, a number of cycle-rickshaw pullers filed Civil, Writ Petition No. 563 of .1979 (Nanak Chand v. State of Punjab) and Writ Petition No. 839 of 1979 (Azad Rickshaw Pullers Union (Regd.) Ch. Town Hall, Amritsar v. State of Punjab, (1981) 1 SCR 366.

4. Meanwhile, and to the same end, the Municipal Corporation of Delhi had amended the Cycle-rickshaw B