The Regional Transport Authority (RTA) must give an opportunity to make representations and specify the ground for granting a temporary permit, and the RTA's Secretary does not have the authority to issue such a permit.

( 1 ) THE petitioner is a permit holder in respect, of the route Burdwan to Guskara via Suri Road and owns a stage carriage being No. W. G. H. 8016. There is another permanent stage carriage route namely Guskara to Bon-Naba-gram. The route between Burdwan to Bon-Nabagram via Suri Road covers the whole of the route Burdwan to Guskara and proceeds further on to a distance of 4 to 5 miles.

( 2 ) ON February 13, 1969, the respondent No. 5 (Dayamoyee Transport Service) applied for a temporary permit for 4 months from February 16, 1969, to June 15, 1969, in the route Burdwan to Bon-Kabagram via Suri Road for two Up and Down trips daily. On this application the Secretary to the Regional Transport Authority the respondent No. 4 (B. K. Majumdar, Secretary, Regional Transport Authority, Burdwan) made an order on the next day February 14, 1969, granting a temporary permit for four months with effect from February 16, 1969. It is this order which is the subject-matter of challenge in this Writ petition. The petitioner as the holder of a regular stage carriage permit for the route Burdwan to Guskara via Suri Road contends that the order granting a temporary permit is bad on several grounds to which I shall presently refer; and therefore appropriate writs and orders should be issued directing the respondents to cancel, rescind and withdraw the said order granting the temporary permit to the respondent No. 5.

( 3 ) FOUR points were urged by Mr. K. K. Moitra learned Advocate for the petitioner. The first point urged by him was that his client was the holder of a permanent stage carriage permit in the shorter route mentioned above and was therefore seriously affected by the grant of a temporary permit to the petitioner. Therefore it was argued that a notice and an opportunity to show cause should have been given to the petitioner, who should also have been heard in the matter of the grant of the temporary permit to the respondent No. 5. The second point urged by Mr. Moitra was that under Section 62 of the Motor Vehicles Act, 1939, (hereinafter referred to as the Act) a temporary permit could be granted only for one or other reasons set out in Clauses (a), (b), (c) and (d) of the said section. But the order granting the permit does not specify for which of the four reasons the temporary permit was granted to the respondent No. 5 and therefore the order is bad. The third contention of Mr. Moitra was that the respondent No. 4 as the Secretary of the respondent No. 1 had no authority or jurisdiction to grant the temporary permit inasmuch as it is the respondent No. 1 alone who has the authority to grant a temporary permit under Section 62 of the Act. The fourth point urged by Mr. Moitra was that there is no provision in the Act for re-issuing a temporary permit as was purported to be done by the impugned order dated February 14, 1969, as the statute only authorised the grant of a temporary permit for a period of four months for the reasons set out in Clauses (a), (b), (c) and (d) of Section 62 of the Act.

( 4 ) WITH regard to the first point mentioned above Mr. Moitra submitted that the procedure prescribed by Section 47 of the Act should have been followed by the respondent No. 1 in granting the temporary permit. This section requires that after taking into consideration the matters set out in Clauses (a), (b), (c), (d), (e) and (f), the Regional Transport Authority shall take into consideration any representations made by persons already providing passenger transport facilities by any means along or near the proposed route or area. It was argued that the petitioner was a person, who already provided passenger transport facilities on the major portion of the route itself, and therefore, the respondent No. 1 was bound to give a show cause notice to the petitioner and an opportunity of making representations against the grant of the temporary permit to the respondent No. 5. It was next argued that the procedure prescribed by Sec