Bibek Chaudhuri, J. – The petitioners are proprietorship travel agents. Petitioners No. 1, 2, and 3 are primarily authorized rail e-ticket agents of IRCTC. The rest travel agencies are further authorized by the petitioner no. 01, 02, and 03 travel agents as their Retail Service Proprietor (RSP) to book the railway e-tickets and manual tickets. Thus, all the petitioners are performing their duties as Principle Service Provider (PSP) or Retail Service Provider for sale and advance booking of Railway e-tickets. They have their centers for e-ticketing at their respective offices outside the premises of Patna Railway Station and Rajendra Nagar Railway Station.

2. The petitioners have jointly filed the instant writ petition praying for the issuance of appropriate raids thereby, prohibiting the Railway Protection Force (RPF) deployed in Patna Junction, Danapur Junction, and Rajendra Nagar Terminal from conducting illegal raids outside their jurisdictional limits, search, and seizures without obtaining consent and giving pre-raid information to the local police station within whose jurisdiction the offices of respective travel agents were situated. The petitioners. The petitioners have also prayed for a declaration that initiation of proceeding under Section 143 of the Indian Railways Act, 1989, against the petitioners' consequent arrest of the travel agents production of the arrested persons before the Railway Magistrate, Patna, and remanding them to judicial custody are bad in law, and violating Article 14,19 and 21 of the Constitution of India as well as the decision of the Hon’ble Supreme Court in Arnesh Kumar vs. State of Bihar, reported in (2014) 8 SCC 273.

3. They have also prayed for consequential reliefs.

4. The case of the petitioners is that the petitioners as travel agents have been working as Retail Service Providers by booking authorized railway e-tickets in which public money is spent and there is no public interest involved with regard to their act of selling railway e-tickets. Petitioners No. 1,2, and 3 are the Primary Service Providers under IRCTC. The rest petitioners are the Retail Service Providers to book railway e-tickets and manual tickets for a certain period of time as per the agreement with the IRCTC.

5. Thus, petitioner no. 01, Puja Travels has been authorized to book railway e-tickets, using the passcode of M/s Jayaswal Enterprises Pvt. Ltd. Petitioner no. 4 is authorized to book Railway e-tickets as per Railways e-ticketing terms and conditions using the passcode of M/s Birdres Technologies Pvt. Ltd franchise system terminal connected to IRCTC system. Petitioner no. 5 is a Retail Service Provider under Principle Service Provider under Spice Money Ltd. To book Railway etickets. Similarly, petitioner no. 06 and petitioner no. 7 are the RSPs under PSP M/s Jayaswal Enterprises Pvt. Ltd. To book Railway e-tickets. Petitioner no. 8, is a retailer of M/s Birdres Technology Pvt. Ltd., which is one of the principal service providers under IRCTC. Further, the case of the petitioners is that the petitioners being the travel agents book tickets as per demands of the customers from their respective offices, situated within the jurisdiction of different police stations in the city of Patna, Danapur, and Rajendra Nagar. None of the offices of the petitioners are situated within the platform or passenger area of any of the aforesaid railway stations. However, the grievance of the petitioners is that members of the Railway Protection Force (RPF) in utter violation of their jurisdiction as described in the Railway Protection Force Act, habitually conduct illegal raids in the offices of the said travel agents. The petitioners contend that such raids were periodically conducted by the RPF for illegal gratification in the name of monthly wasooli. According to the petitioners, they do not have any jurisdiction to conduct any r