M/S S.S. Stone Crusher vs State Of Uttarakhand And Others
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Uttarakhand High Court

M/S S.S. Stone Crusher vs State Of Uttarakhand And Others on 23 February, 2024

     HIGH COURT OF UTTARAKHAND AT NAINITAL

  THE HON'BLE CHIEF JUSTICE MS. RITU BAHRI
                   AND
 THE HON'BLE JUSTICE SRI RAKESH THAPLIYAL
                            23rd February, 2024

                    Special Appeal No. 427 of 2021

M/s S.S. Stone Crusher                               ........Appellant
                                  Versus

State of Uttarakhand and others                      .....Respondents

Counsel for the appellant          : Mr. Piyush Garg and Mr. Nikhil
                                     Singhal, learned counsel.
Counsel for the State of           : Mr. B.P.S. Mer, learned Brief
Uttarakhand                          Holder.

Upon hearing the learned Counsel, the Court made the following:

Judgment: (per Ms. Ritu Bahri, C.J.)

             The appellant has given challenge to the order dated
18.08.2021, passed by the learned Single Judge in Writ Petition (M/S)
No.1646 of 2021, M/s S.S. Stone Crusher Vs. State of Uttarakhand and
others, whereby the Writ Petition was dismissed on the ground that
earlier he had approached this Court by way of Writ Petition (M/S) No.
428 of 2019, which was disposed of and this was the second Writ
Petition on the same cause of action and this Writ Petition was not
maintainable.


2.           Perusal of the order dated 19th February, 2019, Annexure-8
of the Writ Petition, at page 37 of the paper book, shows that the
petitioner in that Writ Petition had confined his prayer to the extent that
direction be issued to the competent authority to decide the appeal and
interim relief application expeditiously and the Writ Petition was
disposed of by observing that if the petitioner deposits Rs.5 lacs with
the District Magistrate, Haridwar, the recovery proceedings initiated
against the petitioner shall be kept in abeyance and the competent
                                     2




authority was to decide the appeal and interim relief application within
four weeks.


3.            Pursuant to the order dated 19th February, 2019, an order
dated 26th September, 2019, was passed by the respondent No.1, i.e.
appellate authority and this order was challenged by the petitioner in the
Writ Petition and the learned Single Judge has dismissed the Writ
Petition on the ground that earlier he had approached this Court in Writ
Petition (M/S) No. 428 of 2019, and on the same cause of action, the
second Writ Petition is not maintainable.      This finding is factually
incorrect as in the earlier Writ Petition, direction was only to the
competent authority to decide the appeal and the appellate authority
passed an order on 26th September, 2019, which was challenged by the
petitioner in Writ Petition (M/S) No. 1646 of 2021.


4.            The Special Appeal is allowed. The order dated 18th
August, 2021 is being set aside. Matter is being remanded back to the
learned Single Judge to pass an order on merits after hearing both the
parties with respect to the order dated 28th September, 2018 passed by
the District Magistrate and the order dated 26th September, 2019 passed
by the appellate authority, in accordance with law.



                                        ___________________________
                                                     Ritu Bahri, C.J.

___________________________ Rakesh Thapliyal, J.

Dt: 23rd February, 2024 S/M