Manipur High Court: In a case wherein a notice was issued by the District Magistrate to the arms holders to submit their license along with their arms and the same was challenged stating that there was no provision for such re-verification had been made, a Single Judge Bench of M.V. Muralidaran, J.* dismissed the writ petition and opined that the District Magistrate had every right to re-verify the arms or check the arms that have been granted.
The petitioner filed the present writ petition challenging the notice issued by the District Magistrate wherein it was informed that who all were holding arms license had to submit their license along with the arms registered on or before 1-3-2023 to their respective police stations as entered in the arms license.
Counsel for the petitioner submitted that without having any authority of law, the respondent had issued the impugned notice and there was no provision for such re-verification in the Arms Act, 1959 and the Arms Rules, 2016 framed there under and the respondent even failed to mention under which provision he had issued the impugned notice. Thus, it was submitted that the impugned notice should be set aside.
The Court noted that the impugned notice had been issued by the respondent as per the Arms Act, 1959 and the Arms Rule, 2016 and the non-mentioning of the relevant section in the impugned notice was not fatal. The Court further opined that the authority of issuing the arms license had every right to re-verify or check the arms licenses so granted and the petitioner could not dictate the authority stating that the submission of license granted by the license authority was more than sufficient and submitting of arms under the custody of the respective police stations as entered in the arms license was not called for. The Court further opined that if the petitioner was having any grievance over the impugned notice, he was at liberty to submit explanation/representation to the concerned authority and challenge made to the impugned notice was not sustainable. Thus, the Court dismissed the writ petition.
[Longjam Nandakumar Singh v. State of Manipur, 2023 SCC OnLine Mani 113, decided on 13-3-2023]
Advocates who appeared in this case:
For the Petitioner: Senior Advocate M. Hemchandra;
Advocate Rinika Maibam;
For the Respondents: GA Shyam Sharma.
*Judgment authored by: Justice M.V. Muralidaran
