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Judgment
The present appeal is directed against an order dated 24th April, 2020 passed by the learned Single Judge in W.P.(C) No.6639 of 2020. By the said writ petition, the Appellant has challenged his termination dated 17th February, 2020 whereby Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Limited (HPCL) (Respondent No.1) terminated the LPG distributorship agreement dated 28th October, 2013 which had been renewed on 9th March, 2019.
The dealership in question was located at village-Brahmabarada Kalan coming under Rasulpur Block, District-Jajpur. The question that arose was whether the Residence Certificate originally submitted by the Appellant to satisfy the eligibility criteria for holding the distributorship was validly issued. The enquiry made by the HPCL revealed that the Appellant was originally a resident of village-Chandapur and not Brahmabarada.
It appears that while the above enquiry was in progress, the Appellant produced another Residence Certificate dated 30th January, 2013 issued by the Tahasildar, Rasulpur certifying him to be a resident of Brahmabarada. This was then challenged by the Respondent No.6 before the Sub-collector, Jajpur by filing Misc. Appeal No.20 of 2013. The said appeal was allowed by an order dated 27th January, 2015, challenging which the Appellant filed W.P.(C) No.2582 of 2015 in this Court. The said writ petition was dismissed on 11th September, 2017. The order of the learned Single Judge was further affirmed by the Division Bench on 5th February, 2018 by dismissing Writ Appeal No.340 of 2017. This was then challenged by the Appellant before the Supreme Court of India in SLP(C) No.13004 of 2019. That SLP(C) stood dismissed. The result of the first round of the litigation was that the Appellant being found to be a resident of Chandapur and not Brahmabarada attained finality. This made him ineligible to the grant of dealership in the first place. The cancellation of the dealership was, therefore, merely consequential upon the above litigation.
The Appellant however tried to keep the issue alive by filing Civil Suit No.268 of 2019 in the Court of the Civil Judge (Sr. Division), Chandikhole. He sought a declaration that he is a permanent resident of Brahmabarada. Unfortunately for the Appellant the fact of the pendency of the above civil suit was not disclosed in W.P.(C) No.6639 of 2020 filed by the Appellant questioning the cancellation of his dealership by the termination letter dated 17th February, 2020 issued by HPCL. This compounded the difficulty for the Appellant. The learned Single Judge, therefore, rightly took an adverse view on the conduct of the Appellant.
As noted by the learned Single Judge in the impugned order, the first round of litigation went against the Appellant, thereby confirming that he was not a resident of Brahmabarada but of Chandapur. The Appellant’s attempt at overcoming that difficulty and assailing the letter dated 17th February, 2020 of HPCL terminating the dealership agreement, had to necessarily fail.
The Court is unable to find any error having been committed by the learned Single Judge in dismissing the Appellant’s writ petition by the impugned order.
The writ appeal is, accordingly, dismissed.
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