IMPORTANT POINT
Legal heirs of a deceased sole proprietor are entitled to reconstitute a distributorship without excluding other legal heirs.

JUDGMENT :

KARDAK ETE, J.

1. Heard Mr. S. Parasar, learned counsel for the petitioner. Also heard Mr. A. Jahid, learned counsel for all the respondents.

2. By filing this petition, the petitioners have prayed for a direction to the respondents IOCL to allow and approve the re-constitution of LPG distributorship of M/s Oil Valley Gas Concern, Makum in favour of the petitioners without any insistence or inducting or submitting a fresh proposal along with the legal heir of late Bidya Prabha Borsaikia.

3. The brief facts of the case, shorn of unnecessary details, are that the petitioner No. 1 and petitioner No. 2, are the wife and son of late Dhananjoy Borsaikia ,who had operated LPG Gas Agency in the name and style M/s Oil Valley Gas Concern, Makum. While running the gas agency Dhananjoy Borsaikia had met with an immature death.

4. The petitioners have filed WP (C) 5586/2015 praying for a direction to the respondents IOCL to reconstitute the said LPG distributor M/s Oil Valley Gas Concern, Makum in the name of the petitioners as they are the legal heirs of late Dhananjoy Borsaikia.

5. In the said writ petition Smti Bidya Prabha Borsaikia, who was arrayed as respondent No. 4, the mother of Late Dhananjoy Borsaikia, opposed the prayer of the petitioner in the above mentioned writ petition on the ground that she was also one of the legal heir and is also entitled to a share in the gas agency to be reconstituted in the name of the legal heir of late Dhananjoy Borsaikia. During the course of the hearing in the said writ petition, the mother of late Dhananjoy Borsaikia have agreed to execute a fresh partnership deed with the petitioners on the same terms as executed in the deed dated 15.05.2024.

6. Taking note of the submission of the parties, this Court disposed of the writ petition on 01.06.2017 with a direction to the petitioners and the mother of late Dhananjoy Borsaikia to enter into a fresh deed of partnership incorporating the same terms and conditions as contained in the partnership deed dated 15.05.2014. It further directed the respondents to act on the same and issued necessary order reconstituting the LPG gas agency. Thereafter, when the reconstitution was under process and was not completed due to obstruction/objection, by the mother of late Dhananjoy Borsaikia, the writ petitioners again approached this Court by filing WP (C) 5735/2019 praying for a direction to the respondents to allow and permit the petitioners to reconstitute the LPG distributorship by excluding the mother of late Dhananjoy Borsaikia. During the pendency of WP (C) 5735/2019, unfortunately, the mother of late Dhananjoy Borsaikia expired and accordingly, her name was deleted from the array of parties in the said writ petition. On 12.01.2021, the learned counsel for the petitioners submitted before the Court that upon such development when the matter was informed to the respondent authorities, a communication dated 12.11.2020 has been issued to the petitioners wherein, it has been stated that the proposal for reconstitution has reached with the revised share of the partners and few more days would be required to finalize the matter.

7. Mr. A. Jahid, learned counsel appearing in WP (C) 5735/2019 did not dispute the factum and submitted that reasonable time may be granted for finalizing the matter. Considering the submission of the learned counsel for the parties, this Court disposed of the writ petition vide order dated 12.01.2021 directing the respondents to finalize the proposal for reconstitution submitted by the petitioner.

8. By filing this present writ petition, the petitioners have prayed for a direction to re-constitute the LPG distributorship of M/s Oil Valley Gas Concern, Makum in favour of the petitioners without any insistence or inducting or submitting a fresh proposal along with the legal heir of the late mother of late Dhananjoy Borsaikia.

9. It is noticed that on the same day when the writ petition being WP (C) 5735/2019 disposed of, the communication