HC to rescue of blind PCO owner, tells AIIMS to restore his licence

The Times of India 18 March2008 P. 7 Delhi

Castigating AIIMS for hankering after more license fee, the Delhi High Court has quashed its decision to remove a visually challenged man working as an STD booth operator inside AIIMS campus since 1994, when he was allotted the booth, because he couldn’t pay the hiked fee. A division bench of Justice A K Sikri and Justice Vipin Sanghi also ordered the Centre and AIIMS authorities to frame guidelines for allotment of shops to disabled persons on the Institute’s premises keeping in mind the needs of the disabled. Expressing anger over the way a blind booth operator was dispossessed of his shop by the Institute authorities after cancelling his licence, HC said, ‘‘The government or the local authorities have not framed the requisite schemes in favour of persons with disabilities for preferential allotment etc.’’ Quashing the August 12, 2004 public notice inviting tender by the AIIMS authorities for running the STD booth, the Court directed it to frame a scheme within six months and said that the Disability Act is in force for the past 12 years but the government had failed to comply with the provisions. The Court allowed the plea of petitioner Sanjay Jha, who has been running the shop for past 14 years, and said his contract be renewed by fixing a reasonable licence fee on the basis of an ‘objective yardstick’. ‘‘Disability provisions warrant a different approach and cannot be tied down by such audit objections on mode of license fee,’’ the two judges observed. Jha, who is visually impaired, said he was allotted the shop on AIIMS premises in 1994 on an 11-month contract basis but that has been regularly renewed at a higher licence fee. However, in August 2004, the AIIMS management had issued a public notice inviting applications for the allotment of premises and removed him from the booth, he alleged.

With thanks from The Time of India
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