Absence of statutory notification does not invalidate FIFO allocation of inter-State transport permits.

The State Transport Authority, West Bengal, by resolution dated 12 December 2024, under Agenda No. 22, granted precedence to the application of the proforma respondent, Debarghya Dhar Mahapatra, for an inter-State stage carriage permit over the similar application of Bijoy Naskar, by applying a First In First Out (“FIFO”) methodology.

Naskar challenged the resolution in WPA 1053 of 2025.

The learned Single Judge allowed the writ petition, holding that FIFO was not an approved or valid policy, that the methodology had not been notified, and that it was contrary to the statutory scheme governing permits.

The State preferred the present appeal with a delay.

Although the condonation application numerically misstated the period of delay, the Court found that the entire delay from the date of the impugned order, 22 April 2025, had been explained.

The delay was accordingly condoned in CAN 2 of 2025.

In the appeal, the State contended that no specific statutory provision governed the issuance of inter-State permits or required prior Gazette notification of the FIFO policy.

The writ petitioner relied principally on Section 71(3)(d) of the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988, and challenged FIFO as lacking transparency and violating equality and fairness.

The proforma respondent argued that Section 71(3) applied only to city routes in towns with populations of not less than five lakhs and not to inter-State transport.

Whether the absence of a Gazette notification declaring FIFO as the applicable methodology invalidated the State Transport Authority’s resolution granting precedence in the issuance of an inter-State stage carriage permit.

Whether Section 71(3), particularly Section 71(3)(d), governed the grant of inter-State stage carriage permits.

Whether the FIFO methodology and the consequential resolution dated 12 December 2024 were constitutionally or statutorily invalid for want of transparency, equality, or procedural fairness.

The Court examined the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988, particularly Section 71(3), which empowers the relevant authority to prescribe limits and related conditions concerning stage carriages on city routes in towns having a population of not less than five lakhs; the Court held that the provisions in clauses (a) to (d) are interconnected and confined to that statutory context.

Section 67, concerning transport policy, passenger convenience, competitive fares, prevention of overcrowding, road safety, coordination of transport systems, and promotion of competition, was held not to directly regulate the grant of permits to fresh applicants.

Section 212 was held to prescribe the manner of making and publishing rules, but not to constitute an independent source of power to frame directions governing inter-State permit allocation.

The Court found no specific statutory provision prescribing the modalities or parameters for granting State or inter-State stage carriage permits, nor any statutory requirement that a FIFO policy for such permits be published in the Official Gazette.

However, administrative decision-making concerning permit allocation remained subject to constitutional and statutory standards of transparency, equality, and fairness.

The Court held that Section 71(3) could not be invoked to invalidate the impugned resolution because its clauses were directed to regulation of stage carriages on specified city routes and did not extend to inter-State transport.

Similarly, Sections 67 and 212 did not create a direct requirement that a policy governing inter-State permit allocation be notified in the Official Gazette.

Consequently, the learned Single Judge’s grounds based solely on the absence of notification and alleged statutory infraction were held unsustainable.

Nevertheless, the Court distinguished the question of statutory notification from the separate question of whether FIFO itself was transparent, rational, and constitutionally valid.

Since the learned Single Judge had not adjudicated that challenge on merits, the appellate court declined to decide it in the first instance, observing that doing so would deprive the parties of consideration by the writ court.

The matter was therefore remanded for examination of the constitutional and statutory validity of FIFO and the consequential legality of the resolution.

The appeal was partly allowed: the judgment dated 22 April 2025 in WPA 1053 of 2025 was set aside, and the writ petition was remanded to the learned Single Judge having current determination.

The remand was limited to determining whether the FIFO methodology adopted for granting inter-State stage carriage permits was constitutionally or statutorily valid and, consequentially, whether the State Transport Authority’s resolution dated 12 December 2024 was valid and lawful on that ground.

CAN 1 of 2025 was disposed of consequentially, with no order as to costs.