Excelsior Correspondent
SRINAGAR, Apr 19: High Court today sought personal appearance of Regional Transport Officer (RTO) Kashmir with regard to issuance of circular seeking re-registration of vehicles purchased outside the J&K UT.
The Division Bench of Justice Ali Mohammad Magrey and Justice V C Koul after hearing the petitions challenging the circular directed for personal appearance of RTO Kashmir along with the record pertaining to the issuance of the circular.
Two petitions came to be filed before the court one of them was filed as Public Interest but the court refused to treat the petition as PIL and referred the same to the Division Bench for hearing.
The petitioner counsel submitted before the court that the RTO has no power to issue such kind of circular and referred section 47 of the Motor Vehicles Act which provides the power and jurisdiction for assigning a new registration mark on a vehicle to the Central Government.
In order to clarify the issue, the court sought the personal appearance of RTO along with the record pertaining to the circular on April 21. Court in its earlier order viz-a-viz apprehensions of the seizure of vehicles by the petitioner counsel at the hands of police under the garb of the circular, has expected that the Advocate General would take care of those apprehensions.
Petitioner counsel pleaded before the court that the Section 47 of the Act provides the power and jurisdiction for assigning a new registration mark on a vehicle to Central Government and in absence of the delegation of the powers otherwise vesting with the Central Government, the respondents-transport department have no authority to issue a Circular under challenge in terms of the instant Petition.
The petition has been filed by one Zahoor Ahmad Bhat through his senior counsel Faisal Qadri under Article 226 of the Constitution of India, seeking directions for quashing the Circular bearing No.RTO/K/ESTT/85-95 dated 27.03.2021 on the ground that the same is in contravention to Section 47 of the Motor Vehicles Act 1988.
Another petition was filed by one Irshad Hussain Munshi as PIL which the Chief Justice on last hearing rejected to treat as PIL and referred the same to the division bench for hearing along with the petition filed by petitioner-Bhat earlier.
The said circular was issued from the office of Regional Transport Officer Kashmir directing all vehicle owners who have purchased their vehicles outside to get those vehicles registered as fresh as per the provision of Motor Vehicles Act.
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