ORDER :- This is an application under Article 226 of the Constitution of India by the Chamba Valley Transport Limited for enforcement against the respondent, the State of Himachal Pradesh, of the fundamental right to carry on business guaranteed by Article 19(g).

2. The Company came into being before the inauguration of Himachal Pradesh under an agreement with the former Hill State of Chamba, and was plying transport vehicles, on hire between Chamba and Bannikhet on 5-year permits, which were to expire on 31-7-1952, until stopped from doing so on and from 30-9-1949 by a notice, dated 10-9-1949, from the Deputy Commissioner of Chamba prohibiting the Company from running the motor service because the administration had decided to nationalise transport in the State.

3. It will be noticed that the Company carried on its business for about a year and a half after the integration of the Hill States into Himachal Pradesh before it was stopped by the respondent The respondent was a shareholder in the Company and had two persons, the Deputy Commissioner of Chamba and one Mehta Autar Chand, as its nominees on the directorate of the Company. After stoppage of their business, and in response to an offer contained in the said notice, the petitioner Company sold their stock-in-trade to the respondent, and, at a cost of over a lac of rupees, the latter nationalised transport in the State and began to run vehicles of their own. After several unsuccessful demands, the last dated 8-11-1950, when representatives of the Company are alleged to have waited on the Development Secretary, the present petition was filed on 1-12-1950.

4. Basing its title on the contract with the respondents predecessor, the State of Chamba, on the unexpired 5-year permits and on infringement of its aforesaid fundamental right, the petitioner Company prays for issue to the respondent directions, orders or writs in the nature of mandamus, prohibition, quo warranto, or any of them, directing the respondent

"(a) to discontinue to ply transport vehicles on hire between Chamba and Bannikhet,

(b) to allow the petitioners to ply their transport vehicles on hire for the period provided in their agreement; and (c) to compensate the petitioners for the less of income and damages already sustained by them, and which they will continue to suffer till they are permitted to ply their vehicles, as they had been doing upto 30th September 1949; and for the grant of such other relief as may be just and expedient.

5. The petition has been opposed by the respondent on various grounds, to be referred to presently. In the course of arguments the learned counsel for the petitioner gave up his stand on the contract and the 5-year permits and confined himself to the infringement of the fundamental right of the petitioner, and the learned Government Advocate admitted that running of transport by the petitioner Company was not stopped under any provision of the Motor Vehicles Act.

6. In view of these concessions by learned counsel the disposal of this case lies within a much shorter compass. Only questions relating to the fundamental right arise for determination, but not those relating to contract or permits. Certain arguments put forward by learned counsel, despite the aforesaid concessions, therefore, become irrelevent, and they will not be adjudicated upon. These were: that it was open to the present Government not to reeognise the ante-cession right based on contract between the petitioner and the former State of Chamba - (Secretary of State v. Bai Rajbai, AIR 1915 PC 59); that the issue or refusal of permits is solely within the discretion of the transport authorities and it is not a matter of right enforceable by issue of a writ under Article 226 of the Constitution - G. Veerappa Pillai v. Raman and Raman Ltd., AIR 1952 SC 192; that the grantor of the licence (Chamba State) having transferred the property affected thereby (the Chamba-Bannikhet road), the transferee (the respondent) is not, as such

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