Decks were today cleared for cancellation of the illegal permits of private transport operators and implementation of the new transport scheme in Punjab, with a division bench of the High Court of Punjab and Haryana staying the single judge orders quashing the government’s notices to such transporters.A total of 650 show cause notices were issued to private transporters for cancellation of their illegal permits on the directives of Chief Minister Captain Amarinder Singh. However, the transporters had approached the High Court and a single judge had quashed the notices on May 23, 2018.The state government had sought to cancel the permits in order to implement its New Transport Scheme, re-formulated in conformity with the previous judgment of High Court in the case of Vijayant Travels and in a bid to clean out the transport system in the State.Defending the action and policy of the State Government, Additional Advocate General for the State, Rameeza Hakeem brought to the notice of the Court that this matter stood referred as the Division Bench was already monitoring the implementation of the Judgment in Vijayant Travels, which had subsequently been upheld by the Supreme Court.
Reacting strongly to the quashing of such Show Cause Notices by the Single Bench, the Division Bench of High Court headed by Justice Suryakant remarked “Our observations in Vijayant Travels were completely ignored by the Single Judge. We want to break this transport mafia and we want to have clean and new players to enter the transport field in Punjab”.With this stay order, all the show cause notices against illegal permits stand revived and replies will have to be filed by all such private operators as to why their illegal permits should not to be cancelled.The Court, while staying the judgment of the Single Judge, accepted the request of Senior Advocate Puneet Bali, appearing for the private transport operators, that they be given time of three weeks to submit their replies before the Regional Transport Authorities.Further, directions were passed that all writ petitions/proceedings relating to the implementation of the Vijayant Travels judgment be listed after taking orders of the Chief Justice. The next date of hearing in the matter is 23rd August, 2018.