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Haj is not for making profits, says apex
court
Friday July 27, 2012 08:50:32 PM,
IANS
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New Delhi:
The Supreme Court Friday said private tour operators (PTOs)
engaged in travel and stay arrangements of Haj pilgrims going to
Makkah and Madina could not undertake their enterprise with an eye
to profits.
"Haj is not for making profits," said the apex court bench of
Justice Aftab Alam and Justice Ranjana Prakash Desai in the course
of the hearing of a batch of petitions by PTOs, seeking to be
registered for the allocation of Haj seats.
While declining to interfere with the Haj policy related to PTOs
for 2012, the court said there was a lot of scope for improvement.
The court said the policy should be "just, reasonable and fair" to
all concerned and not lead to monopolisation of travels of the Haj
pilgrims by a few private operators.
According to the Haj PTO policy for 2012, anyone with an annual
turnover of Rs.1 crore in either 2009-10 or 2010-11 was eligible
to be registered.
The PTOs, who moved the court Friday, contended that those who had
a turnover of Rs.1 crore or more in year 2011-12 too should be
considered for registering as Haj PTO.
They said that during 2009-10 and 2010-11, they had a turnover of
Rs.50 lakh and in 2011-12, they had touched a turnover of Rs.1
crore and it made them eligible for registration and allocation of
Haj seats.
As the senior counsel for the petitioners were making their pleas,
Justice Alam told the lawyers that every day he was receiving two
to three letters, "some with abuses".
"All kind of letters are coming" because of the court's decision
not to let a husband and wife register as independent PTOs.
Senior counsel Dushyant Dave, appearing for one of the PTOs, said
registration of Haj PTO should not be allowed to become an 'Old
Members' Club', monopolising over the pilgrims' travel and stay
arrangements.
"This (monoploising by some) is really bothering. This will become
a frozen thing. You have to have a mechanism where there is space
for freshers. Policy must have a scope for choice for consumers",
Dave told the court.
Justice Alam said: "We are not saying that Haj PTO policy was
sacred or inalterable. If we accept Dave's contention, then others
will come asking why ceiling."
Reiterating that the court was not going to make any changes in
the Haj PTO policy for 2012, the court said "now we will focus on
PTO policy".
The court said the "anomalies pointed" to it would not survive in
the next Haj PTO policy.
"This is not the last Haj. It is being performed and will continue
to be performed", the court said by way of reassuring the
petitioners.
The attorney general said accepting the plea of the PTOs would
lead the policy to the area of arbitrariness and that was exactly
being sought to be avoided. This was reopening of the entire
issue.
The court was given a report by counsel Haris Beeran on the
registration of PTOs who had aired their grievance before the
court that their applications were either refused or rejected even
though they were qualified. In total, they were 244.
The report by Beeran said that after going through all the
applications, 12 were approved for registration as Haj PTOs.
Beeran was asked by the apex court to go through the applications.
For looking into the draft PTO policy for 2013, the court directed
the listing of the matter in November.
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