Early Times Report
Jammu, Nov 14: High court judge Alok Aradhe today held that petitioners had no legal right to insist that fair price shops should be converted to government-controlled depots.
"The policy decision has been taken by the government to cater to needs of 20 lakh additional beneficiaries and this court cannot interfere with the policy decision," he said.
The court directive came in a bunch of petitions, seeking to restrain the state from opening new fair price shops in Jammu division on the ground that it was in violation of the cabinet decision of July 16, 2014.
Dismissing the petitions, Justice Aradhe held that petitioners in no way were affected by implementation of new policy as they would continue to run the fair price shops on commission basis. Otherwise also, the petitioners neither had any legal or fundamental right to be appointed as agents of a fair price shop under a government scheme. Therefore, the petitioners could not seek a writ of mandamus to enforce the decision taken by the cabinet, which did not culminate into an order as required under section 45 of the Constitution of Jammu and Kashmir and which otherwise 'stands superseded by an order of the state government dated August 4, 2016', the court ordered. (JNF) |
