1 IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT BOMBAY CIVIL APPELLATE JURISDICTION LETTERS PATENT APPEAL NO.76 OF 2008 IN WRIT PETITION NO.1679 OF 2008 Mr. Vitthal K. Shetty ..... Appellant. v/s The State of Maharashtra & Ors. ...... Respondents. ------ Ms. Bobby Malhotra for the appellant. Mr. R.P. Behere, Additional Government Pleader for the respondents. ------ CORAM: SWATANTER KUMAR, C.J. AND V.M.KANADE, J. DATE : 8TH APRIL, 2008. P.C.: 1. Present appeal is directed against the order dated 18/03/2008 passed by the learned Single Judge, declining to interefere with the order dated 10/09/2007 wherein the Commissioner of Police, Mumbai had directed suspension of licence for a period of 30 days against the present appellant. The appellant was served with show cause notice dated 23/12/2005 under section 33 of the Bombay Police Act, 1951 and under the Public Premises Entertainment Act. After pointing out various violations in the show cause notice, the authorities had noticed four violations and the details of four violations were annexed to schedule- A of this show cause 2 notice. The show cause notice clearly stated that the authorities concerned proposed to impose the punishment of cancelling the police licnece in terms of Rule 27 in entertainment licence, to which the petitioner admittedly filed a detailed reply and has annexed the order of the Court wherein the petitioner had been acquitted in the past for various alleged offences. 2. Consequent to the show cause notice, the impugned order dated 10/09/2007 was passed, resulting in filing the Writ Petition which was dismissed by the order impugned in the present appeal. 3. The learned Counsel appearing for the appellant primarily argued that there is non-application of mind and, in fact, the provisions of Bombay Police Act and for that matter Public Premises Entertainment Act have not been correctly invoked by the authorities concerned. Secondly, it is submitted that in view of the acquittal of the appellant in cases which are based on same facts and the order having been passed by the Court of competent jurisdiction, the authorities have no jurisdiction to pass an order suspending the licence resulting in consequent closure of the restaurant of the petitioner. 4. We are unable to find any merit in either of these contentions. It cannot be disputed in law that the Commissioner of Police has power to pass an order 3 suspending licence. In fact, the provisions of relevant law clearly give power to the Commissioner of Police even to cancel the licence. The learned Single Judge has clearly noticed in the impugned order that the Commissioner of Police has suspended the licence by exercising his power under section 162(2) of the Bombay Police Act and the power conferred is independent of the powers conferred under section 131 of the Act. Once the source of power is traceable in statutory rules, the mere fact that they have not been specifically spelt out in the show cause notice per se will not be sufficient to invalidate the proceedings. Further, in the show cause notice, authorities had also mentioned that in the year 1994 Police Licence of the appellant was also suspended for a period of 10 days and in 2003 appellant was warned for violating Police Licence. Besides that, it was mentioned in the show cause notice as also in the final order that from the report received from the local police who had raided the premises of the petitioner and on verifying the record in their Office in respect of the establishment of the petitioner it was found that he was not the proper person to hold the licence. The effect of acquittal in criminal cases will be inconsequential because violation of terms of licence may not necessarily result in conviction and particularly in the present cases where the appellant was acquitted for want of independent witnesses and preparation of panchanama. In other words, this was not the conclusion on merits of the case. Further, the learned Single Judge has exercised his discretion in consequence of the settled principles of law. 4 We may also notice that large period of suspension is already over. 5. We, therefore, see no reason to interfere with the impugned order. Appeal is dismissed. CHIEF JUSTICE V.M. KANADE, J.