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United Air Travel Services v. Union of India (Ministry of External Affairs)

Writ Petition (Civil) · 2018 INSC 453Decided 7 May 2018
Writ Petition (Civil) No. 631 of 2016
Justice J. Chelameswar · Justice Sanjay Kishan Kaul

Background

A batch of private tour operators (PTOs) who organise Hajj and Umrah pilgrimages were disqualified from getting a quota of Hajj 2016 pilgrim seats, even though they had previously qualified in 2015 but simply missed out in a lottery draw. Under the Court-approved Hajj policy, such operators were supposed to be exempt from certain documentation conditions when reapplying: yet the government's rejection letters cited failure to meet exactly those exempted conditions as the reason for disqualification.

Decision Breakdown

The Supreme Court held that a government order must be judged by the reasons actually stated in it and cannot later be justified by different reasons offered in court, relying on the Constitution Bench ruling in Mohinder Singh Gill vs. Chief Election Commissioner. Since the stated grounds for rejection were conditions from which the petitioners had been expressly exempted, the rejection was patently arbitrary and violated Article 14. Because the 2016 and 2017 Hajj seasons had already passed, reinstating the petitioners' quota was no longer possible, so the Court instead awarded public-law compensation of Rs. 5 lakh to each petitioner for the loss of business, along with costs, and allowed the government to recover these amounts from the officials responsible for the unsustainable orders.

Lesson Learnt

When a government body's own written order gives a reason for rejecting someone that doesn't hold up, the courts will not let it be rescued by new reasons offered later, and where restoring the original benefit is no longer possible, courts can award monetary compensation against the state for arbitrary official action, even to be recovered from the responsible officials personally.

Official source (sci.gov.in)View Judgment (PDF)

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