ROW OVER HC ORDER ALLOWING MORE VENDORS IN AMRITSAR

CHANDIGARH: An order of a single judge of the Punjab and Haryana high court allowing more vendors to sell crackers ahead of this Diwali in Amrisar than the limit fixed by a division bench has stoked a controversy.

Now the division bench of justice AK Mittal and justice Amit Rawal will ponder over whether the singe judge, justice Rajbir Sehrawat, acted in violation of the division bench order.

It was on October 13 that the high court division bench had directed Punjab, Haryana and Chandigarh to allot licences for selling of crackers to not more than 20% of the vendors given licences last year.

However, acting on the petition of some Amritsar vendors, justice Sehrawat passed an order on October 17 allowing 39 vendors to sell the crackers in place of 10 vendors to which permission was granted by administration after October 13 order.

Justice Sehrawat, while allowing more vendors to sell crackers, had recorded that number of licenses in Amritsar has been restricted to unreasonably low number by interpreting the order of the bench. He had passed the order after petitioner had argued that number of licences, as restricted by the administration, is unrealistic because although Amritsar has a population of more than 15 lakh, only 10 licenses have been issued; whereas under those very directions, 96 licences have been issued in Chandigarh even as its population is around 8 lakh. During the hearing, when the HC asked amicus curiae Anupam Gupta to address arguments, Gupta termed the order “subversive of judicial discipline” and said the single judge acted in violation of division bench. HTC