“Don’t Use A Hammer To Kill An Ant”: Bombay HC Quashes Zilla Parishad’s Order That Terminated Contractor’s Licence

The Court was hearing a Petition that impugned an order passed by the Zilla Parishad, by which the Zilla Parishad terminated the Petitioner’s Contractor license without granting the Petitioner any hearing.

The bench of Justice M.S.Sonak and Justice Kamal Khata observed, “The allegation had no reasonable nexus with the discharge of contractual obligations by the Petitioner. The impugned order was made without hearing the Petitioner. The impugned order is non-speaking in the sense that it does not even briefly indicate why Petitioner’s explanation was found unacceptable. In any event, the impugned action defies the doctrine of proportionality. The impugned action of Respondent No. 2 reminds us of the classic idiom “Don’t use a hammer to kill an ant””

Advocate R.D. Suryawanshi appeared for the Appellant and Advocate Nikhilesh Pote appeared for the Respondent.

Brief Facts-

The present case is an unusual case in which a contractor’s (on the panel of the Zilla Parishad) license was terminated because of his alleged conduct on a solitary occasion of barging into the Parishad hall where a meeting was on.

While referring to the ground of “unsatisfactory work” relied on by the Counsel for the respondent the Court observed that there is not even any such allegation in the show cause notice.

The Court referred to the “Wednesbury principle of reasonableness” as contained in Associated Provincial Picture Houses Ltd. v. Wednesbury Corpn. and according to the Court Lord Greene, M.R held, “a decision of a public authority will be liable to be quashed or otherwise dealt with by an appropriate order in judicial review proceedings where the court concludes that the decision is such that no authority properly directing itself on the relevant law and acting reasonably could have reached it.”

The Court further mentioned the Tata Cellular case where Bombay HC mentioned two other facets of irrationality:

“(1) It is open to the court to review the decision-maker's evaluation of the facts. The court will intervene where the facts taken as a whole could not logically warrant the conclusion of the decision-maker. If the weight of facts pointing to one course of action is overwhelming, then a decision the other way, cannot be upheld.

(2) A decision would be regarded as unreasonable if it is partial and unequal in its operation as between different classes.”

The Court noted that the disruption was not due to any malafide intent by the Petitioner but was caused by an unexpected incident unrelated to the Petitioner’s contractual work.

Accordingly, the Court said that by applying the test of Wednesbury’s unreasonableness as well as the proportionality test, the action of terminating the license of the Petitioner is clearly disproportionate and warrants interference.

Finally, the Court disposed of the Petition.

Cause Title: Himalay Manohar Patil vs. The state of Maharashtra & Anr (Neutral Citation: 2024:BHC-AS:25941-DB)

Appearance:

Appellant: Adv. RD Suryawanshi, Adv. Rohan Hule.

Respondent: Adv. Nikhilesh Pote, Adv. Manan Talati and AGP Rupali Shinde

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