IN-Abs/train-data/summary/1709.txt

The respondent corporation appointed an expert committee to go into the question as to the working of nationalised transport in the State.
The Committee laid down the criteria for determining the order in which 331 areas and routes had to be selected for nationalisation and had drawn up a list of the remaining districts in which nationalisation should be successively taken up.
Accordingly, Nellore would have been the next district to be taken up and the turn of Kurnool district would have come up after nationalisation of the routes in Nellore, Chittore and Cuddapah districts were completed.
This report was submitted to the Corporation in February, 1961 and the Corporation accepted it and embodied the approval in its Administration Report dated March 24, 1962 which was published in April, 1962.
After the General Election in 1962 the Chief Minister assumed office as Chief Minister on March 12, 1962.
On April 19, 1962, he summoned a conference of the Corporation at which, he suggested that the nationalisation of bus routes in the Kurnool district should be taken up first.
By its resolution dated 4 5 1962, the Corporation made an alteration in the order of the districts, successively to be taken up for nationalisation and selected the western half of the Kurnool as the area to be nationalised in the first instance.
The appellants, motor transport operators whose routes were all in western half of the Kurnool districts filed objections to the Schemes before the Transport Minister.
The Transport Minister approved the schemes.
Thereafter, the Corporation applied to the Regional Transport Authority for permits.
The appellants then challenged the validity of the schemes in the High Court and in support of that allegations were made in the affidavit that the Chief Minister was motivated by bias and personal ill will against the appellants, that he felt chagrined at the defeat of his partymen and supporters and desiring to wreak his vengeance against the motor transport operators of the western parts of Kurnool, his political opponents, instructed the Corporation to change the order in which the districts should be taken up for nationalisalion and that the corporation gave effect to these instructions and directions.
These allegations were not denied by the Chief Minister, nor was an affidavit filed by any person who could claim to know personally about the truth about these allegations.
The High Court repelled these allegations and dismissed the petition.
On appeal by certificate the appellants mainly contended: (1) that the schemes did not in reality reflect the opinion of the Corporation as required by section 68 C of the Act, but that the schemes owed their origin to the direction of the Chief Minister who acted malafide in directing the Transport Undertaking to frame the impugned schemes; (2) that the approval of the schemes by the Transport Minister under section 68 D(3) must be held to be vitiated by the malafides of the Chief Minister; (3) that the impugned schemes did not conform to the statutory requirements of section 68 C and rule 4 of the Rules regarding the particulars to be embodied in the schemes; (4) that some of the routes included in the schemes were inter state routes and that under the proviso to section 68 D(3) it could not be deemed to be an approved scheme unless the previous approval of the Central Government had been ob tained and (5) that even when a transport undertaking applies for a stage carriage permit under section 68 F(1) it must comply with the provisions of r. 141 of the Rules.
Held: (1) On the evidence placed in the present case it must be held that it was a result of the conference of the 19th April, 1962 and in 332 order to give effect to the wishes of the Chief Minister expressed there, that the impugned schemes were formulated by the Corporation and therefore, it would be vitiated by malafides notwithstanding the interposition of the semi autonomous corporation.
Though the counter affidavits contained a denial of the allegation that the Corporation was acting at the behest of the Chief Minister, there was no explanation for the choice of the western portion of Kurnool district Therefore, the impugned schemes were vitiated by the fact that they were not in conformity with the requirements of section 68 C of the Act.
(ii) There was nothing on the record to indicate that the Chief Minister influenced the Transport Minister.
Besides, the Transport Minister stated on oath that in considering the objections under section 68 D(3) and approving the schemes he was uninfluenced by the Chief Minister.
Therefore, it cannot be held that his approval of the schemes did not satisfy the requirements of the law.
(iii) In the present case some of the variations between the maxima and minima in the number of the vehicles proposed to be operated on each route were such as to really contravene r. 4 of the Andhra Pradesh Motor Vehicles Rules.
Dosa Satyanarayanamurthy vs The Andhra Pradesh State Transport Corporation, , referred to.
(iv) The route which was proposed to be nationalised under the scheme admittedly lay wholly within the State.
The right of the private operators to ply their vehicles beyond the State border was not affected by any of the schemes.
Therefore, the proviso to section 68 D(3) was not attracted and consequently the schemes did not suffer from the defects alleged.
(v) The High Court was right in holking that the Regional Transport Authority which is specifically mentioned in section 68 F(1) is empowered to issue the permit to the transport undertaking "notwithstanding anything to the contrary contained in Chapter IV" and that the section rendered the provisions of r. 141 of the Motor Vehicles Rules inapplicable to cases covered by section 68 F(1).
No doubt, in a State where there is no Regional Transport Authority at all, but there is some other authority which functions as the Regional Transport Authority for the purposes of the Act, such an authority might be that which would be comprehended by section 68 F(1) but where as in Andhra Pradesh there is admittedly a Regional Transport Authority, it cannot be held that such authority is deprived of the power to issue a permit by reason of section 68 F(1) merely because the Regional Transport Authority of that area cannot grant permits under Chapter IV. 333