IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT PATNA CWJC No.13487 of 2009 Rajesh Kumar son of Shri Krishna Kumar at Bhawanipur, P.S. Sakari, District Madhubani at present resided at Lakshmisagar, in the town and district Darbhanga Versus 1. The State of Bihar through Secretary, Department of Transport, Patna. 2. The Transport Commissioner, Government of Bihar, Patna. 3. The District Transport Officer, Darbhanga. ----------- 3 13/11/2009 Tax token of the petitioner should have been issued in the year 2002 itself but that was not done by the authorities apparently because of some failure in payment of road tax. The petitioner wants a direction from this Court to the authorities to consider the problems of the petitioner and take a decision in accordance with law. Following some earlier orders there have been stereo type orders issued by this Court in several matters directing the authorities to consider the cases of such persons who have approached this Court with a grievance that the authorities are not issuing tax token against law. Now our attention is focused on the delay aspect of the matter. As per law every vehicle owner operating his vehicle such as bus in the present case is obliged to pay road tax as per law and operate his vehicle only if it has valid tax token. Delay of - 2 - seven years in approaching this Court is enough indication that the vehicle has run without tax token during this period. Plea is that the petitioner has been depositing money on account of road tax from time to time as per his calculation. The authorities should have ensured that the bus does not ply without tax token but apparently that has not been done. The plea of the petitioner that the authorities should have decided the matter at the earliest has no legs to stand because he chose not to approach this Court earlier if there was failure on the part of the authorities for seven years. On account of such inordinate delay; especially when the matter involves revenue of the State through road tax, we are not inclined to render any help to such person in exercise of writ jurisdiction. It is for the State to see what action has to be taken against the State authorities who are at fault in not deciding the matter for long seven years and has acted collusively in permitting such vehicles to ply for a number of years. This writ petition is, therefore, dismissed with the observations aforesaid. It goes without saying that refusal to exercise writ jurisdiction will not stand in the way - 3 - of the petitioner in moving other authorities or approaching appropriate court of law in accordance with law. AMIN (Shiva Kirti Singh, ACJ) (Shyam Kishore Sharma, J.)