Single judge order on railway platform stalls upheld

Two women had filed petitions challenging an order asking them to pay arrears of licensee fee up to the period of their occupation of stalls

It is a settled legal position that the right of Railway Board to take a policy decision to hand over stalls for vending eatables/refreshments in railway platforms to the Indian Railways Catering and Tourism Corporation (IRCTC) has been upheld. Similarly is the law that licensees cannot have existing right to seek for renewal after change of policy, the Madras High Court has said.

A Division Bench comprising Justices D.Murugesan and K.K.Sasidharan was upholding a single judge's order on two writ petitions. Earlier, J.Chandrika and A.Saradammal had filed petitions, along with others, challenging an order of September 2009 asking them to pay the arrears of licensee fee up to the period of their occupation of the stalls during the pendency of the writ petitions and consequently to vacate and hand over possession of the stalls to IRCTC to enable the successful bidders to operate.

The single judge having noticed that various attempts made by the erstwhile licensees who were granted licences for the stalls prior to 2000 and had managed to continue the business in spite of court orders upholding the Railway Board's revised policy, found no merit in the petitions and dismissed them. In fact, the judge found that the writ petitions were clear abuse of the process of law as the petitioners had successfully thwarted the steps taken by the railways and IRCTC in respect of Chennai division.

Hence, the present appeals.

The Bench said earlier judgments of the High Court and Supreme Court would make the legal position clear declaring that the appellants who were licensees prior to 2000 could not have any subsisting right to seek for renewal based on earlier licences given to them after the revision of policy. Though the appellants claimed that they were widows and were entitled to reservation under the reservation for freedom fighters, women, including war widows etc, the said reservation was zone-wise and not station-wise. Even otherwise, it could be seen that initially the stalls were allotted to their husbands and after their demise, the stalls had been transferred in the appellants' names.