ORDER :

1. The menace of road accidents is increasing day by day taking away the lives of thousands. One facet of cause of road accidents is plying of motor vehicles with excess load than permissible.

2. Before proverbial travelling into the litigation in these batch of writ petitions, it is apt to extract the observations of Justice V.R.Krishna Iyer in Rattan Singh v. State of Punjab (1979) 4 SCC 719). It reads as under:

"This is a ease which is more a portent than an event and is symbolic of the callous yet tragic traffic chaos and treacherous unsafety of public transportation – the besetting sin of our highways which are more like fatal facilities than means of mobility. More people die or road accidents than by most diseases, so much so the Indian highways are among the top killers of the country. What with frequent complaints of the State’s misfeasance in the maintenance of roads in good trim, the absence of public interest litigation to call State transport to order, and the lack of citizens’ tort consciousness, and what with the neglect in legislating into law no-fault liability and the induction on the roads of heavy duty vehicles beyond the capabilities of the highways system, Indian Transport is acquiring a meaning reputation which makes travel a tryst with Death. It looks as if traffic regulations are virtually dead and police checking mostly absent. By these processes of lawlessness, public roads are now lurking death traps. The State must rise to the gravity of the situation and provide road safety measures through active police presence beyond frozen indifference, through mobilization of popular organization in the field of road safety, frightening publicity for gruesome accidents, and promotion of strict driving licensing and rigorous vehicle invigilation, lest human life should hardly have a chance for highway use.”

[emphasis supplied]

3. These observations are symbolic of the malady that has crept into use of public roads and thirty years later the situation is more grave.

4. In substance, in all these writ petitions, petitioners assail seizure of their motor transport vehicles and seek release of the vehicles. The seizure of vehicles is assailed on the ground that it violates their right to carry on business in transportation as guaranteed by Article 19(1)(g) of the Constitution of India.

5. The seizure of vehicles in issue is primarily on the ground that at the time of inspection, the vehicle was carrying load in excess of permissible limit i.e., sand or other commodities/without weigh bills without permit/and in some cases, inter-state transport of sand without transit permit, etc. Following the earlier decisions of this Court, in these matters, interim directions were granted, directing grant of interim custody of the vehicle to the owner of vehicle subject to his depositing Rs. 2000/- and additional amount of Rs.1000/- per tonne of excess load, unloading charges with other conditions. In all these orders, no restraint is imposed on prosecution proceedings. What was granted was only an interim custody of the vehicle. In terms thereof, on depositing the amount specified in the respective interim orders, vehicles were released.

6. Learned counsel for petitioners placed extensive reliance on the directions issued by this Court in several decisions and prayed to affirm the order granting interim custody of vehicles.

7. According to learned counsel for petitioners, as directed by this Court in K.Ram Reddy v. Government of Andhra Pradesh and others (2014 (3) ALD 651), it is mandatory for the checking officials while checking the vehicles on the allegation of contravention of the Act, 1988 to give option to the driver/owner/accompanier of the vehicle to opt for payment of penalties specified instantaneously for release of vehicle as an interim measure instead of seizing the vehicle, and though circular instructions are issued by the Commissioner for Transport, they are observed more in breach and in spite of request made