The main legal point established in the judgment is that under Section 68(3)(ca) of the Motor Vehicles Act, the State Government is exclusively authorized to formulate and specify the route or routes for plying of stage carriage permits, and permits granted without compliance with this requirement are illegal and void.

Hari Nath Tilhari, J.—All these writ petitions involve common question of law as to construction of Sections 68(3)(ca), 70, 72 and 80 of Motor Vehicles Act, 1988 and Section 217 thereof and its effect as such are being disposed of by one common judgment. These petitions were placed for hearing regarding admission and interim orders were sought for to direct the Respondents not to issue and not to grant permits unless the State Government under Section 68(3)(ca) of the Motor Vehicles Act, formulates the routes as only, it has the authority to formulate the routes and unless the routes are formulated by the government, the Regional Transport Authority or State Transport Authority have no jurisdiction to grant permits even if the policy of liberalised grant of permit is there.

2. The learned Counsel contended that the writ petitions may be admitted and the interim order may be granted as it has been done in very many cases. From the perusal of the petition it appears that the interim relief in the nature of main and principle relief claimed in the petition has been sought. Looking to the good number of such cases, I called upon the learned Government Counsel if the interim relief in such nature can be granted where main relief is claimed at this stage. The learned Counsel for the Petitioners submitted that it would be better for the Court at this stage to hear the petition and pass final order if interim relief cannot be granted. That in view of above, I heard the Counsels for Petitioners on merits. The learned Government Counsel was also called upon to reply the Petitioners contentions.

3. In these petitions, it has been submitted that Petitioners before this Court are all operators in various regions and Petitioners case is that after the coming into force of the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988, the old Motor Vehicles Act of 1939, stood repealed and it has been contended on behalf of the Petitioners that their lordships of the Supreme Court have also laid it down that the provisions of Sections 47(3) and 57 have also ceased to operate.

4. The lordships of the Supreme Court in the case of Mithilesh Garg Vs. Union of India and Others, AIR 1992 SC 447 observed as under:

6. The Parliament in its wisdom has completely effaced the above features. The scheme envisaged under Sections 47 and 57 of the old Act has been completely done away with by the Act. The right of existing operators to file objections and the provision to impose limit on the number of permits have been taken away. There is no similar provision to that of Section 47 and Section 57 under the Act.

5. The learned Counsels invited my attention to Sections 68, 70, 71 and 72 of the Motor Vehicles Act as well as to Section 74(i) of the Motor Vehicles Act. The learned Counsels contended that from the perusal of provisions it can well be said that formulation of routes by the State Government is essential, before the making of an application, for grant of permit by the Regional Transport Authority or State Transport Authority. The learned Counsel contended that one of the requisites is that in the application, the applicant has to specify the routes for and in relation to which permit is sought. The learned Counsel contended that without specification of routes in the application, the permit cannot be granted as per mandate of law. On the basis of the above provisions, the learned Counsel contended that the route is to be specified in the application, and unless the route has been formulated by the State Government which has been specified as authority competent in that behalf no other authority is competent to formulate the route so it cannot be specified in the application for grant of permit as well. He further urged that neither Regional Transport Authority nor State Transport Authority has got any jurisdiction or authority to grant or issue permits, in view of principles of law and mandate of law contained in Sections 72, 74, etc., until routes are formulated by the government