Govt. Of State Of Bihar and Ors vs Ram Bharosa Singh and Anr
Rewritten Version Notice: This is a rewritten version of the original judgment.
Court: Supreme Court of India
Case Number: Appeal (civil) 113 of 1954
Decision Date: 17 February 1956
Coram: V. Bose, B. Jagannadhadas, B.P. Sinha, S.J. Imam, N.C. AIYAR
In the appeal titled Government of State of Bihar and Others versus Ram Bharosa Singh and Another, the judgment was delivered on the seventeenth day of February, 1956 by a bench consisting of the learned judges V. Bose, B. Jagannadhadas, B. P. Sinha, S. J. Imam and N. C. Aiyar. The case was recorded as Civil Appeal No. 113 of 1954. The petitioner was the Government of the State of Bihar together with other respondents, while the respondents were Ram Bharosa Singh and an additional party. The judgment appears in the 1956 volume of the All India Reporter at page 640. The learned judge Chandrasekhar Aiyar delivered the opinion of the Court.
The dispute arose over the operation known as the Patna Ganges Ferries, which was governed by the Bengal Ferries Act of 1885, commonly cited as Bengal Act 1 of 1885. The plaintiff, respondent 1 Ram Bharosa Singh, claimed a right to the ferries against the Government of the State of Bihar and respondent 2 Nagendra Narain Singh. The District Magistrate of Patna initially issued a notice that a public auction for the ferries would be held on the twenty‑second day of December, 1952, with the purpose of granting a lease for a period of three years commencing on the first day of April, 1953, and ending on the thirty‑first day of March, 1956. Subsequently, the magistrate withdrew the ferries from the public auction because the State Government decided to extend the existing lease that had been granted to respondent 2 for an additional two‑year term, also effective from the first day of April, 1953. To effect this extension, a new lease deed was executed and registered on the twentieth day of December, 1952, specifying a two‑year duration. The plaintiff’s complaints addressed to the District Magistrate, the Commissioner, and the State Government failed to obtain relief, prompting him to file a petition in the Patna High Court under Article 226 of the Constitution seeking a writ of mandamus. The High Court held that the District Magistrate’s action of withdrawing the public auction on the instructions of the State Government was not lawful, because the statute required the magistrate to act on his own initiative. Moreover, the Court found that neither the Act nor its accompanying rules conferred any authority to extend the term of an existing lease. Accordingly, the High Court issued a writ canceling the magistrate’s order and directed him to issue a fresh notice for a public auction.
After the two‑year lease expired on the twentieth day of December, 1954, a new auction was conducted, and both respondents, namely Ram Bharosa Singh and Nagendra Narain Singh, were successful in becoming lessees. The present appeal does not concern any rights that may exist between the two respondents. The Government of the State of Bihar is interested solely in the correctness of the construction applied by the High Court to the Bengal Ferries Act and its rules. The learned Advocate General for the State invited the Court to express its view on whether the District Magistrate possessed any authority to extend the term of a lease that had been granted as a result of a public auction.
The issue before the Court concerned whether the District Magistrate possessed the authority to prolong the duration of a lease that had been created by means of a public auction, a power that the State sought to clarify for future administrative guidance. The Court affirmed that it fully accepted the interpretation adopted by the High Court. To determine the scope of the Magistrate’s powers, the Court examined Sections 7, 8 and 9 of the Bengal Ferries Act. Section 7 provides that the control of all public ferries is vested in the district magistrate, subject only to the direction of the Commissioner. Section 8 states that the immediate superintendence of each public ferry belongs to the magistrate of the district in which the ferry operates, or to any other officer that the State Government may appoint by name or designation from time to time; such magistrate or officer, except when the ferry tolls are leased, must arrange for the supply of boats and collect the authorized tolls. Section 9 authorises the lease of the tolls of any public ferry by public auction for a term that the district magistrate may fix, provided the Commissioner approves. The section further empowers the magistrate or his authorized officer, for a reason recorded in writing, to refuse the highest bid, to accept a lower bid, or to withdraw the tolls from auction altogether. It also requires the lessee of the tolls, once a lease is granted, to execute a contract specifying the conditions of the lease and to furnish security for performance of those conditions.
Rule‑making authority is conferred on the District Magistrate by Section 15 of the Act. For the present purpose it suffices to note the introductory part of that section, which allows the magistrate, with the Commissioner’s approval, to make rules consistent with the Act for purposes such as management of public ferries, regulation of traffic at ferries, determination of the time, manner and person by whom ferry tolls may be leased by auction, compensation of persons who have paid in advance for tolls when a ferry is discontinued before the paid period expires, and generally to carry out the purposes of the Act. Rule 2 stipulates that every Patna‑Ganges ferry shall either be held “khas” by the Magistrate or be leased by public auction. Rule 7(d), relied upon by the learned Advocate General, limits the maximum period for which a lease may be granted to three years. Consequently, the statutory scheme provides for either direct possession by the magistrate or lease by public auction, and does not convey any express or implied power to extend an existing lease beyond the prescribed maximum term.
In this case the Court examined the purpose and design of the Act together with the rules that govern ferries in the district. The scheme, as the Court understood it, required either that the ferries be held in khas possession by the District Magistrate or that a public auction be conducted for granting a lease of the ferries. The Court observed that no express or implied authority existed for the District Magistrate to prolong the period of a lease that had already been granted. Although it is undisputed that the Magistrate may decline to accept the highest bid, may choose to accept a lower bid, or may even withdraw the ferries from the auction altogether, the Court clarified that such discretion does not permit the Magistrate to abandon the auction process nor to extend the lease term indefinitely according to his personal convenience. The Court emphasised that the maximum duration for any lease could not exceed three years, and that at the conclusion of each three‑year term a fresh public auction had to be held to determine the new bids. The insistence on a public auction, the Court noted, served as a safeguard against arbitrary exercise of executive power, a principle illustrated in the earlier decision of The State of Assam v. Keshab Prasad Singh, 1953 SCR 865; 1955 AIR (SC) 309 (A). After setting out this reasoning, the Court concluded that the appeal was dismissed, but ordered that the parties bear no costs.