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Dr Satyanarayana Sinha v. S. Lal And Company (P) Ltd. .
Factual and Procedural Background
The State of Bihar originally decided to exploit apatite deposits in the public sector and therefore rejected all private applications, including one dated 22 March 1965 by Respondent 1 seeking a lease over 280.62 acres in Singhbhum District. Subsequently, finding the deposits “dispersed” and better suited for private exploitation, the State sought and obtained Central Government permission to lease 1999.634 acres (which included, but was not limited to, the area once sought by Respondent 1) to the financially qualified appellant, Dr. Satyanarayana Sinha. On 30 August 1969 a mining lease was accordingly granted.
Respondent 1 filed a writ petition in the Patna High Court on 15 September 1969 challenging this lease. Although the appellant was arrayed as a respondent, he received no notice and the matter proceeded ex parte so far as he was concerned. The High Court held that the Central Government had not complied with Section 31 of the Mines and Minerals (Regulation and Development) Act, 1957 (“the Act”) read with Rules 58 and 59 of the Mineral Concession Rules, 1960 (“the Rules”), and quashed the lease. The present civil appeal is against that judgment.
Legal Issues Presented
- Whether Respondent 1 had the requisite locus standi as a “person aggrieved” to maintain the writ petition when the area covered by his own application was ultimately not part of the lease granted to the appellant.
- Consequently, whether the High Court’s quashing of the appellant’s lease could stand.
Arguments of the Parties
Appellant's Arguments
- Respondent 1 lacked locus standi because none of the 280.62 acres he had applied for formed part of the appellant’s lease; therefore he was not a person aggrieved.
- The State had given valid reasons—accepted by the Central Government—for granting the lease, so the requirements of Section 31 and Rules 58–59 were met.
Central Government's Arguments (Respondent 2)
- Rule 59 was inapplicable because the State never firmly “reserved” the area; if Rule 59 does not apply, compliance with Rule 58 is unnecessary.
- Even assuming Rule 59 applied, the Central Government had recorded reasons adequate to justify relaxation under Section 31.
State of Bihar's Position (Respondent 3)
- Notwithstanding its earlier recommendation and execution of the lease, the State now contended before the Supreme Court that the grant was invalid—an about-face noted by the Court.
Table of Precedents Cited
| Precedent | Rule or Principle Cited For | Application by the Court |
|---|---|---|
| Ebrahim Aboobakar v. Custodian General of Evacuee Property, AIR 1952 SC 319 | Appellate court may examine questions such as locus standi and maintainability even if not urged in the court below. | Used to justify the Supreme Court’s decision to entertain the appellant’s new contention on Respondent 1’s lack of standing. |
| Chiranjit Lal Chowdhuri v. Union of India, AIR 1951 SC 23 | Under Article 32, the right enforced must ordinarily be the petitioner’s own legal right. | Cited to underline that a petitioner must show infringement of his own right to invoke writ jurisdiction. |
| The State of Orissa v. Madan Gopal Rungta, AIR 1952 SC 12 | Existence of the right claimed is the foundation for writ jurisdiction under Article 226. | Relied on to reinforce the necessity of a demonstrable legal right for locus standi. |
| Calcutta Gas Co. Ltd. v. State of West Bengal, AIR 1962 SC 1044 | Ordinarily, the right must be personal, but in exceptional cases strangers may seek writs. | Discussed to show the threshold for strangers; Court finds no exceptional circumstance here. |
| Godde Venkateswara Rao v. Government of Andhra Pradesh, AIR 1966 SC 828 | Clarifies that even a non-proprietary personal interest can confer standing, but only if prejudicially affected. | Used to demonstrate that Respondent 1 was not prejudicially affected. |
| R. v. Thames Magistrates’ Court, ex parte Greenbaum (UK) | Court’s discretion to intervene: by a party aggrieved the Court acts ex debito justitiae; by a stranger only if public interest so demands. | Referred to illustrate comparative principles; Supreme Court concludes no public-interest basis exists here. |
Court's Reasoning and Analysis
The Court first noted the undisputed factual position that Respondent 1’s 280.62-acre application area did not overlap with the 1999.634 acres leased to the appellant. Consequently, Respondent 1 had no proprietary, fiduciary, or other personal interest in the subject-matter of the lease.
Applying the locus-standi jurisprudence distilled from Ebrahim Aboobakar, Chiranjit Lal, Madan Gopal, Calcutta Gas, and Godde Venkateswara Rao, the Court held that a writ petitioner must ordinarily establish an infringement of his own legal right. Exceptional relaxation for “strangers” is permitted only where public interest so demands, a circumstance absent here.
Because Respondent 1 lacked standing, the Supreme Court found the writ petition non-maintainable and deemed it unnecessary to examine the High Court’s conclusions on the procedural validity of the lease under Section 31 and Rules 58–59.
Holding and Implications
Appeal Allowed; writ petition dismissed.
The lease granted to the appellant stands revived. Costs are awarded to the appellant against the State of Bihar. The judgment turns solely on locus standi and therefore sets no new precedent on the substantive mining-law questions, but it reinforces existing principles that only persons with a demonstrable legal interest may invoke Article 226.
P. Jaganmohan Reddy, J.— The appellant was granted a mining lease on August 30, 1969 by the State of Bihar (Respondent 3) with the prior approval of the Central Government (Respondent 2) for winning a mineral known as Apatite over an area of 1999.634 acres. Respondent 1 filed a writ petition on September 15, 1969 challenging the lease on the ground that he had earlier on March 22, 1965, applied for a mining lease over an area of 280.62 acres in certain villages of Singhbhum District which was included in the lease granted to the appellant, but as no orders were passed by the State Government within the statutory period the application was deemed to have been rejected. He thereafter filed a revision petition to the Central Government which called for the comments of the State Government. The State Government intimated to the Central Government that it wanted to work the area itself and for that reason had in fact rejected all the applications for this area including that of the first respondent. On receipts of this comment, the Central Government rejected the revision petition of the first respondent.
2. It appears that the appellant had pursuant to an advertisement in the newspapers applied along with others for the grant of mining lease for phosphatic rock (Apatite) over an area of 4.1 sq. miles in Village Khajurdari in Singhbhum District. But all the applications were rejected as the State Government had by then decided to work the phosphatic bearing areas in the public sector. Later, however, as 3rd respondent felt that such a venture could be better undertaken by a private party rather than the State Government in view of the dispersed nature of the deposits, whose concentrated and efficient supervision may not be possible through the public sector, it decided to release the area in question to be worked in the private sector. Accordingly permission was sought from the Central Government and an advertisement published in the newspapers for the general information of the interested parties who may be willing to set up a benefication plant for upgrading the low grade Apatite to ensure its use for the production of phosphatic fertiliser and who were capable of making an investment to the extent of Rs 40 to 50 lakhs. The appellant who is reported to be financially sound submitted a scheme for setting up a benefication plant for upgrading the Apatite. In view of the financial solvency of the appellant his application was recommended to the Central Government. The Central Government accepted this recommendation and directed the grant of the mining lease in the following terms:
“The Central Government in the interest of mineral development, in exercise of the powers conferred by sub-rule (2) of Rule 58 of the Mineral Conclussion Rules, 1960, hereby authorise the State Government to grant mining lease for apatite over the area to Dr Satyanarayana Sinha without following the procedure laid down in sub-rule (1) of the said Rule 58 of the Mineral Concession Rules, 1960.
Further in exercise of the powers conferred by Section 31 of the Mines and Minerals (Regulation and Development) Act, 1957, the Central Government hereby authorise the State Government to grant mining lease to Dr Sinha over the area in question which does not form a compact block.
The Central Government also, in exercise of the powers conferred by proviso to Section 6(1) of the Mines and Minerals (Regulation and Development) Act, 1957, authorise the State Government to grant mining lease for apatite over the areas to Dr Sinha in excess of the limit of 10 square miles prescribed in Section 6(1) and (b) of the said Act.”
3. Immediately on getting to know of the approval given by the Central Government to the grant of the mining lease to the appellant, the first respondent moved the State Government for a stay and though that application was rejected, he made several other attempts but without any success. The last revision application was filed on November 17, 1970 under Rule 54 of the Mineral Concession Rules — hereinafter referred to as “the Rules” — before the 2nd respondent on which an order dated November 23, 1971 was passed. This order as disclosed by the 1st respondent in his supplementary affidavit shows that the Central Government had, in exercise of their revisional powers under Rule 55 of the Rules, set aside the orders of the State Government and directed it to give further consideration and pass appropriate orders within a period of four months inasmuch as the State Government had not followed the correct procedure in dealing with the application of the 1st respondent.
4. At this stage we may point out that in the writ petition filed by the first respondent though the appellant was a party, it seems he did not appear and the proceeding was ex parte. The appellant's case is that as no notices were served on him, nor was there any proof of service as neither the covers in which the registered notices were sent nor the acknowledgment cards had been returned to the Court, he did not have an opportunity to be heard. No doubt the State of Bihar and the Central Government had opposed the petition, but the High Court came to the conclusion that the conditions required for relaxation of the Rules in special cases under Section 31 of the Mines and Minerals (Regulation and Development) Act, 1967 (hereinafter termed “the Act”) read with Rules 58 and 59 of the Rules, were not complied with while according its approval for the grant of the mining lease to the appellant. In this view it allowed the petition and quashed the lease in favour of the appellant.
5. Before us it is contended by the appellant's learned advocate that the appellant did not have an opportunity of urging before the Court that the writ petition filed by the first respondent was not maintainable, because he is not a person aggrieved as the area for which the first respondent had made an application for the grant of mining lease was not included in the area granted to the appellant. He further contends that reasons were given by the State of Bihar while recommending the grant of the lease to the Central Government, which reasons, at any rate one of them as is evident from the order of the Central Government, were approved. There is, according to him, no infringement of the provisions of Section 31 of the Act read with Rules 58 and 59 of the Rules.
6. The learned Solicitor-General on behalf of the Central Government supports the grant of the mining lease to the appellant on the ground that Rule 59 of the Rules is not applicable to the facts of this case inasmuch as the 3rd respondent had not taken any firm decision to reserve the area granted to the appellant, which is a necessary condition of the applicability of that rule. If that rule did not apply then he submits the procedure prescribed in Rule 58 which is referred to therein need not be complied with. He further submits that even if Rule 59 is applicable, reasons have been recorded by the Central Government for relaxing the Rules as required in Section 31 of the Act.
7. Insofar as the 3rd respondent — the State of Bihar — is concerned, there has been a volte-face in its stand before us. After having called for the applications and recommended the lease in favour of the appellant, and after having placed him in a position where he had to incur huge expense, it now wants to contend that the grant of the lease is invalid. Even the first respondent, once he found that the area for which he applied for a lease was not included in the appellant's lease, seems to have preferred to remain absent in the case, but the State Government wants to challenge the validity of the lease which it did not do before the High Court.
8. There is no doubt, as the High Court has pointed out, that where by relaxing the Rules the Central Government intends to authorise in any case the grant, renewal or transfer of any prospecting licence or mining lease, or the working of any mine for the purpose of searching for or winning any mineral, on terms and conditions different from those laid down in the Rules made under Section 13 of the Act, it can do so for reasons to be recorded in writing. Whether any such reasons can be said to have been recorded in the order authorising the grant of the lease on terms and conditions different from those laid down in the Rules made under Section 13 of the Act need not concern us in this case, because, in our view, as the writ petition has been filed by a person who is not the person aggrieved, it is not maintainable.
9. As already pointed out it is admitted by Respondents 2 and 3 that the application made by the first respondent was not in respect of the area which is granted to the appellant and consequently the first respondent had no interest in the subject-matter of the lease. Even though this contention was not urged before the High Court, and in the circumstances adverted to by us could not have been urged, as the appellant did not appear, this Court in an appeal cannot only determine the soundness of the decision, but has jurisdiction to determine any point raised before it, such as whether the appeal is competent, whether a party has locus standi to present the petition and whether the petition is maintainable etc. See Ebrahim Aboobakar v. Custodian General of Evacuee Property AIR 1952 SC 319, 1952 SCR 696, 1952 SCJ 483. In Chiranjit Lal Chowdhuri v. Union of India AIR 1951 SC 23, 1950 SCR 869, 1951 SCJ 70 it was held by this Court that the legal right that can be enforced under Article 32 must ordinarily be the right of the petitioner himself who complains of infraction of such right and approaches the Court for relief. In respect of the jurisdiction under Article 226 of the Constitution it was laid down in State of Orissa v. Madan Gopal Rungta AIR 1952 SC 12, 1952 SCR 28, 1951 SCJ 764 that the existence of the right is the foundation of the exercise of jurisdiction of the Court under Article 220 of the Constitution. The right to which this Court had adverted as being the foundation for exercising the jurisdiction under Article 32 or Article 226 of the Constitution, according to The Calcutta Gas Company (Proprietary) Ltd. v. State of West Bengal AIR 1962 SC 1044, 1962 Supp 3 SCR 1, (1963) 1 SCJ 106 is ordinarily the personal or individual right of the petitioner himself, though in the case of some of the writs like habeas corpus or quo warranto this rule may have to be relaxed or modified. Subba Rao, J., as he then was, observed in that case:
“Article 226 confers a very wide power on the High Court to issue directions and writs of the nature mentioned therein for the enforcement of any of the rights conferred by Part III or for any other purpose. It is, therefore, clear that persons other than those claiming fundamental rights can also approach the Court seeking a relief thereunder.”
After citing the above passage in Godde Venkateswara Rao v. Government of Andhra Pradesh AIR 1966 SC 828, (1966) 2 SCR 172, (1966) 2 SCJ 270 the learned Judge who delivered the judgment in this case also observed at p. 181:
“A personal right need not be in respect of a proprietary interest; it can also relate to an interest of a trustee. That apart, in exceptional cases, as the expression ‘ordinary’ indicates, a person who has been prejudicially affected by an act or omission of an authority can file a writ even though he has no proprietary or even fiduciary interest in the subject-matter thereof.”
In respect of persons who are strangers and who seek to invoke the jurisdiction of the High Court or of this Court, difficulty sometimes arises because of the nature and extent of the right or interest which is said to have been infringed, and whether the infringement in some way affects such persons. On this aspect there is no clear enunciation of principles on which the Court will exercise its jurisdiction.
10. In England also the Courts have taken the view that when the application is made by a party or by a person aggrieved the Court will intervene ex debito justitiae, in justice to the applicant, and when it is made by a stranger the Court considers whether the public interest demands its intervention. In either case it is a matter which rests ultimately in the discretion of the Court: (See R.v. Thames Magistrates' Court, Exhibit p. Greenbaum).
11. In this case, however, the first respondent has not challenged the grant of the lease on the ground of ex debito justitiae but has done so on the ground of a direct infringement of his right to be granted a mining lease over 280.62 acres for which the appellant was given a lease along with other area. Since it is now found that no such right of the first respondent has been affected, he has no locus standi. He is neither a party nor a person aggrieved or affected and consequently his writ petition in the High Court is not maintainable.
12. On this short ground, this appeal will be allowed and the writ petition filed by the first respondent in the High Court dismissed. The appellant will have his costs only against the State of Bihar.
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