JUDGMENT :

SHAJI P. CHALY, J.

1. The captioned writ petitions are before us on a reference made by a learned single Judge of this Court as per the order dated 15th February, 2016.

2. The subject issue involved in the reference arises under the provisions of the Arms Act, 1959 (for short ‘Act 1959’). The learned single Judge doubted the correctness of the judgments of this Court in Muhammed Shafi vs. District Collector, 2012 (1) KLT 427 and Chandran Nair vs. Additional District Magistrate, 2015 (1) KHC 351, whereby it was held that grant/refusal of the fire arm licence can only be based on the grounds enumerated under Sections 14 and 15 of the Act, 1959 respectively.

3. According to the learned single Judge, the grant/refusal of licence shall also be taking into consideration the requirements of Section 13 (3)(b), which stipulates that a licence under Section 3 in any other case or a licence under Section 4, Section 5, Section 6, Section 10 or Section 12 shall be granted only if the licensing authority is satisfied that the person by whom the licence is required has a good reason for obtaining the same.

4. Therefore, according to the learned single Judge, on a combined reading of Section