Muthukumar S v. The Licensing Authority Cum Regional Transport Officer
BEFORE THE MADURAI BENCH OF MADRAS HIGH Court DATED: 09.09.2021
CORAM
THE HON'BLE MR.JUSTICE R.SURESH KUMAR S.Muthukumar
...Petitioner
-Vs1.The Licensing Authority cum Regional Transport Officer, Regional Transport Office (TN-58), Palankanatham Main Road, Madurai (City) - 625 016, Madurai (Dist).
2.The Inspector of Police, Usilampatti Town Police Station, Usilampatti, Madurai (Dist).
... Respondents Prayer: Writ Petition filed under Article 226 of Constitution of India, to issue a Writ of Mandamus, to direct the respondents to return the petitioner's original driving license bearing DL No.TN60Z20040002663 to him within a time stipulated by this Court. For Petitioner : Mr.V.Selvakumar, For Respondents : Mr.D.Ghandiraj Government Advocate
O R D E R
The prayer sought for in this Writ Petition is for a Writ of Mandamus, to direct the respondents to return the petitioner's original driving license bearing DL No.TN60Z20040002663 to him. 2.The case of the petitioner is that, the petitioner is working as a driver in the Tamil Nadu State Transport Corporation at Cumbum branch. While he was in service and driving the bus bearing Registration No. TN 57 N 2155, on 10.08.2021, in the road between Madurai and Cumbum, at Usilampatty, the bus met with an accident. As a result, a cyclist has become the victim. In this regard, a case was registered in Usilampatti Town Police Station in Cr.No.376 of 2021. Pursuant to which, the driving license of the petitioner has been seized by the respondent police and the same was handed over to the Transport authority, ie., the first respondent. 3.Thereafter, according to the petitioner, no further action was taken and no enquiry was conducted. However, the license of the petitioner has not been returned back to him. Therefore, in order to get back the driving license, the petitioner has given a 1/8
representation to the first respondent on 13.08.2021 and the same also since has not been considered by the first respondent, the petitioner has approached this Court by filing the present writ petition.
4.I have heard, Mr. V.Selvakumar, learned counsel appearing for the petitioner, who reiterated the aforesaid and seeks indulgence of this Court, to issue a direction to the first respondent to return back the driving license of the petitioner.
5.I have heard Mr.D.Ghandiraj, learned Government Advocate appearing for the respondents, who on instructions, would submit that, since the petitioner is involved in a fatal accident, pursuant to which, the driving license of the petitioner having been seized and handed over to the first respondent, who would conduct an enquiry, under Section 19 of the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988, for which, a show cause notice would be issued shortly to the petitioner and depending upon the response to be made in this regard after issuing the show cause notice, after completing the enquiry, a decision would be taken as to whether the license has to be returned or not. Therefore, a direction can be issued to the first respondent to complete the Section 19 enquiry, he contended. 6.I have considered the said submissions, made by the learned counsel for the parties and have perused the materials placed before this Court.
7.In fact, this kind of cases, this Court is almost everyday confronting and in one such case, which came up for hearing on 04.08.2021 in W.P.(MD)No.13365 of 2021, I have considered this issue in detail and passed the following order:
"4.Heard Mr.S.Arunachalam, learned counsel for the petitioner, who would submit that, if at all any proceedings is initiated under Section 19 of the Act by issuance of show cause notice and after getting reply from the person against whom the show cause notice is issued, enquiry should be conducted as to whether any violation had been taken place in this regard by the licence holder and accordingly, order should be passed. However, without conducting an enquiry and without concluding the Section 19 proceedings, the licence in original of the person concerned cannot be retained endlessly by the respondent and the respondent does not have this power. This has also been reiterated in a number of judgments of this Court. Therefore, relying upon those judgments, the learned counsel seeks indulgence of this Court to give a direction to the release of the driving licence of the petitioner by the respondent immediately.
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5.I have heard the learned Government Advocate for the respondent, who would submit that, under Section 19 of the Act, the power of licensing authority to disqualify any person from holding a driving licence or revoke such licence, has been contemplated. In the said section, various circumstances have been mentioned, under which, the licence of the licence holder can be retained or suspended for sometime as a punishment to be awarded in this regard, after conducting enquiry. In this context, in order to have a limited enquiry and take a decision whether any violation has been taken place in this regard on the part of the petitioner/licence holder, the proceedings was initiated and show cause notice was issued, which is a pre-requisite to conduct an enquiry. 9.
Pursuant to the show cause notice, the petitioner seems to have given a reply on 20.07.2021 and based on such reply, certainly the respondent would conduct a limited enquiry and pass order as to whether any violation has been committed by the petitioner or any offence has been committed by the petitioner and after ascertaining the same, final orders would be passed under Section 19 of the Act either to disqualify him from holding the licence or to revoke the licence or otherwise. If any such decision is taken, accordingly the licence of the petitioner either would be suspended or revoked or would be given back to the petitioner, depending upon the outcome of the enquiry to be conducted by the respondent in this regard.
Therefore, quoting the aforesaid proceedings, the learned Government Advocate appearing for the respondent seeks indulgence of this Court to give reasonable time to the respondent to complete the enquiry and pass final orders.
7.I have considered the said rival submissions made by the learned counsel appearing for the parties and perused the materials placed before this Court. 8.In respect of these kind of controversy, a number of orders had been passed by this Court where the law had been held that, without having resorted to a limited enquiry to be conducted in this regard and to come to a conclusion that the licence holder has committed any offence or violated any provisions of the Act as well as the rules made thereunder, the licence cannot be retained or revoked or the holder of the licence cannot be disqualified.
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9.In this context, Section 19 of the Motor Vehicles Act reads thus:
"19.
Power of licensing authority to disqualify from holding a driving licence or revoke such licence .
descriptions of vehicles specified in the licence ; or (ii) revoke any such licence.
(2) Where an order under sub-section (1) is made, the holder of a driving licence shall forthwith surrender his driving licence to the licensing authority making the order, if the driving licence has not already been surrendered, and the licensing authority shall, - (a) if the driving licence is a driving licence issued under this Act, keep it until the disqualification has expired or has been removed ; or (b) if it is not a driving licence issued under this Act, endorse the disqualification upon it and send it to the licensing authority by which it was issued ; or (c) in the case of revocation of any licence, endorse the revocation upon it and if it is not the authority which issued the same, intimate the fact of revocation to the authority which issued that licence:
Provided that where the driving licence of a person authorises him to drive more than one class or description of motor vehicles and the order, made under subsection (1), disqualifies him from driving any specified class or description of motor vehicles, the licensing authority shall endorse the disqualification upon the driving licence and return the same to the holder.
(3) Any person aggrieved by an order made by a licensing authority under sub-section (1) may, within thirty days of the receipt of the order, appeal to the prescribed authority, and such appellate authority shall give notice to the licensing authority and hear either party if so required by that party and may pass such order as it thinks fit and an order passed by any such appellate authority shall be final."
10.If we look at the provisions of Section 19 of the Act, it makes it clear that, if it is satisfied after 5/8
giving the holder of the licence, an opportunity of being heard, if he has committed any offence or has made any violation, the licensing authority, for the reasons to be recorded in writing, can make an order disqualifying the person for a specified period for holding or obtaining any driving licence to dirve any class or description of vehicle specified in the licence or revoke any such licence.
11.That apart, Sub-Section 1 (A) of Section 19 was recently inserted by Motor Vehicles Amendment Act, 2019 (Act 32 of 2019), which came into effect from 19.08.2019 under which, if a licence has been forwarded to the licensing authority under Sub-Section 4 of Section 206, the licensing authority if satisfied after giving holder of the driving licence, an opportunity of being heard may either discharge the holder of the driving licence or it may have detailed reasons recorded in writing make an order disqualifying such persons from holding or obtaining any licence all or any of the class or description of vehicle. For the first offence, such punishment shall be for a period of three months and for second and subsequent offence, the revocation shall be the penalty.
12.These are all the procedures contemplated under Section 19 of the Motor Vehicles Act.
13.Since the statutory duty cast upon the licensing authority that is the respondent herein, he has initiated such proceedings by issuing show cause notice on 19.07.2021 seeking show cause from the petitioner which had been properly responded by the petitioner by giving reply dated 20.07.2021. Now, the ball is in the Court of the respondent so as to immediately conduct an enquiry, of course a limited enquiry, to verify as to whether the petitioner had violated any provisions of the Act as well as the rules made thereunder or any other punishable offences have been committed by him.
14.In this context, it is to be reminded that, merely because a fatal accident had been reported where the vehicle driven by the petitioner is involved, it cannot be presumed that the petitioner has committed a punishable offence as that has to be decided only by the competent Court, where a case would be conducted by the concerned police. However, at this juncture, a limited enquiry can be undertaken by the respondent only to verify whether any provisions of the Act as well as the 6/8
rules made thereunder had been violated by the petitioner. Only for the said purpose, enquiry as contemplated under Section 19 of the Act can go on and after completing such enquiry, if the respondent comes to a conclusion that none of the provisions of the Act as well as the rules has been violated, it is open to the respondent to release the licence to the petitioner. Therefore, after adopting this procedure as has been contemplated under Section 19 of the Act, needful can be done and the final order in this regard shall be passed by the respondent within a timeframe to be fixed by this Court.
15.In that view of the matter, this Writ Petition is disposed of with the following order:- "that there shall be a direction to the respondent to consider the reply given by the petitioner dated 20.07.2021, pursuant to the show cause notice dated 19.07.2021 issued by the respondent and in this regard, after giving a notice conduct a personal enquiry and thereafter final order shall be passed by taking into account the aforesaid observations made in this order and such final order shall be passed within a period of thirty days from the date of receipt of a copy of this order."
16.It is needless to mention that, depending upon the outcome of the final order to be passed, as indicated above, by the respondent, the petitioner shall work out his remedy accordingly. It is also needless to mention that once notice is issued, the petitioner shall cooperate and appear before the respondent for completing the enquiry as indicated above.
17.With these directions, this Writ Petition is disposed of. No costs."
8.Since, the petitioner also is similarly placed and he also seeks indulgence of this Court to issue suitable directions, this Court is inclined to dispose of this writ petition with the following directions:
"that the first respondent is hereby directed to conduct an enquiry under Section 19 of the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988, by issuing a show cause notice to the petitioner, within a period of one (1) week from the date of receipt of a copy of this order and on 7/8
receipt of such show cause notice, the petitioner shall give his reply, within one (1) week, thereafter and on receipt of the said reply from the petitioner, the first respondent shall complete the enquiry and pass final orders thereon, within a period of four (4) weeks, thereafter. It is needless to mention that, depending upon the outcome of enquiry to be conducted by the first respondent, under Section 19 of the Motor Vehicles Act, the decision as to whether the driving license of the petitioner to be returned back or not would be taken on merits and in accordance with law." 9.With these directions, this writ petition stands disposed of. There shall be no order as to costs.
Sd/- Assistant Registrar (CS-I) // True Copy // / /2021 Sub Assistant Registrar(CS) PNM/MR NOTE:
In view of the present lock down owing to COVID-19 pandemic, a web copy of the order may be utilized for official purposes, but, ensuring that the copy of the order that is presented is the correct copy, shall be the responsibility of the advocate/litigant concerned.
To 1.The Licensing Authority cum Regional Transport Officer, Regional Transport Office (TN-58), Palankanatham Main Road, Madurai (City) - 625 016, Madurai (Dist).
2.The Inspector of Police, Usilampatti Town Police Station, Usilampatti, Madurai (Dist).
+1 CC to M/s.SPL GP ( SR-28820[F] dated 13/09/2021 ) Order made in Dated:
09.09.2021 GC(13.09.2021) 8P 4C 8/8