Court No. - 29
Case :- WRIT - C No. - 25414 of 2018 Petitioner :- M/S N.H.A.H Partnership Firm And 3 Others Respondent :- Union Of India And 4 Others Counsel for Petitioner :- Ateeq Ahmad Khan,Mohd. Saleem Khan Counsel for Respondent :- Vikash Chandra Tripathi
Hon'ble Pankaj Mithal,J. Hon'ble Saral Srivastava,J.
Heard Sri Ateeq Ahmad Khan, learned counsel for the petitioners and Sri Vikash Chandra Tripathi, learned counsel appearing for Railways.
The petitioner no. 1 was a partnership firm and was having a licence to run a catering stalls at the Railway Stations. In the said partnership firm petitioner no. 2 and husbands of petitioner nos. 3 & 4 were partners. The term of the licence expired in the year 2008. The two of the partners that is the husbands of petitioner nos. 3 & 4 expired but the petitioner no. 2 continued to run the business in the name of the partnership but individually on month to month licence.
On the basis of a decision of the Supreme Court dated 29.01.2016 a circular dated 15.03.2017 no. 22 of 2017 was issued and all the licensees of the stalls were required to submit application only for one stall alongwith an affidavit.
The Divisional Commercial Manager, Varanasi by the impugned order dated 16.06.2017 has rejected the application of the petitioner for the renewal of the licence even for one stall by stating that the licence of the firm had expired on 24.09.2008 and that its two of the partners are already dead. Therefore, the petitioner no.2 is not entitled to renewal of the licence or to a fresh licence.
The above order has been challenged by the petitioner contending that when the petitioners have been allowed to run the stalls even after the expiry of the licence period in 2008, the respondents are estopped from stopping the petitioner from running the stalls more particularly by alleging violation of Clause-44 of the erstwhile agreement.
Technicalities, apart petitioner no. 1 & 2 are simply licensees on month to month basis and were allowed to run the stalls at the Railway Station accordingly. A licensee has no right to seek renewal or to have a fresh licence on the expiry or termination of the previous licence. Moreover, in view of the decision of the Supreme Court a single person cannot have licence to run several stalls whereas the petitioners have been running 3 stalls and 7 trollies. The relevant part of the order of the Supreme Court is quoted below:
"We, however, make it clear that only those licensees may be eligible for renewal of their licenses who can declare on affidavit that they do not have the license of more than one shop or kiosk in their name or benami license at the railway stations with periodical reasonable increase of license fee."
In view of the aforesaid facts and circumstances, we do not find any error on part of the railway authorities in stopping the petitioner to run the stalls as their licenses stand expired and there is no question of renewal as previously petitioners were having 3 stalls and 7 trollies.
The writ petition is accordingly dismissed.
Order Date :- 30.7.2018 Israr