Court No. - 40
Case :- WRIT - C No. - 12029 of 2016 Petitioner :- M/S Ram Charan & Sons Respondent :- Union Of India And 2 Others Counsel for Petitioner :- Rohan Gupta Counsel for Respondent :- Manoj Kumar Sharma,S.C.
Hon'ble Amreshwar Pratap Sahi,J. Hon'ble Shashi Kant,J.
Heard Sri Rohan Gupta, learned counsel for the petitioner.
This writ petition has been filed for the relief of quashing the impugned demand order dated 2nd March, 2016 issued by the Railway Authorities as against an enhanced license fee for running a stall at Mahoba, Railway Station.
For this, the learned counsel for the petitioner has traced the entire history of the litigation and the contest by the petitioner in relation to the license fee of the stall, the license whereof has not yet been renewed so far. The fact remains that the petitioner continued to make certain deposit uptil 2015, keeping in view, the litigation and the orders that had ensued in between that have been indicated in detail in the impugned order dated 2nd March, 2016.
We may refer to the order of the High Court dated 14th March, 2013 whereby a Division Bench had issued a direction for a determination of the license fee by the Divisional Railway Manager. Learned counsel submits that the order dated 14th March, 2013 was never complied with and no determination took place in terms of the aforesaid directions. He submits that this is also not reflected in the impugned order dated 2nd March, 2016 and as such in the absence of any such determination the undertaking given by the petitioner to make the deposits as per the High Court's order had to be made only in terms of the license fee that was already being paid by the petitioner. He submits that had there been a determination, he would have paid the appropriate license fee as determined by the authorities.
What we find from a perusal of the order dated 2nd March, 2016 is that in paragraph no.2 of the said order, it has been stated that the Divisional Railway Manager/CCM (Chief Commercial Manager) had fixed a license fee of Rs. 2,98,500/- w.e.f. 18th October, 2012 till 31st October, 2013. This is termed as a determination (Nirdharit Ki gai).
So far as the subsequent period is concerned when the renewal was due a further enhancement was made according to the policy of 2010, whereby 10% fee was to be enhanced and accordingly the license fee was fixed at Rs. 3,28,350/-. The basic challenge appears to be that such determination if any has not been made after considering the factors which are to be applied for the purpose of such determination.
In our considered opinion, if this fact is sought to be disputed, then a writ petition for the same is not the appropriate remedy and it is open to the petitioner to raise an arbitration dispute or raise a dispute before the Divisional Railway Manager himself who can consider the same and pass an appropriate or refer it to the arbitrator as the case may be for the purpose of fresh determination or payment by the petitioner or any other license holder who may be affected thereby.
We are accordingly not inclined to keep this matter pending and dispose off this writ petition with a direction to the second respondent to do the needful in the light of the observations made hereinabove.
Order Date :- 24.4.2018 M. ARIF