Rival trader has no right to question permit granted to another merchant: HC

S Shyam Prasad

Bengaluru: A medical shop owner next to a gover nment hospital challenged the permission granted to open a new medical shop inside the hospital premises. The High Court, however, dismissed his petition saying he cannot challenge permission granted to another trader just because his own business would be affected.

“It is well-settled law that a rival trader does not have the locus standi to question a permit or licence granted to another trader. Merely because the petitioner would suffer a financial loss on account of opening of a pharmacy by the Society that would not confer a right on the petitioner to challenge the exemption granted by the State,” Justice NS Sanjay Gowda said in his judgment dismissing the petition filed by one Shahsikiran U. Shashikiran has a medical shop next to the Mahatma Gandhi Memorial General Hospital, Mudigere.

He approached the HC in 2017 challenging the exemption granted to the Taluk Agricultural Produce Co-operative Marketing Society by the Department of Health and Family Welfare to run a medical shop within the premises of the hospital. Shashikiran contended that he runs a medical shop adjacent to the Government hospital and by virtue of the exemption granted to Society his business would suffer and he would incur a heavy loss.

No locus standi

The HC, which heard his petition said in its recent judgement, “It has to be stated here that the State, which owns the Hospital, is at liberty to per mit running of a pharmacy unit of a person of its choice. A trader in the vicinity would have no right to insist that the Gover nment should not allow such units to be set up within the premises of the Government Hospital.”

The trader’s counsel, however, argued that he had filed a petition regarding this earlier and was granted liberty to challenge the exemption granted and therefore he has the locus standi. The HC however pointed out that the discussion in the earlier case filed by Shashikiran was about a different issue.

“It may be pertinent to state here that in the earlier round of litigation, this Court did not consider the question of the petitioner’s locus and this Court only directed the State to take the decision as to whether the Society would fall within the prohibited category,” the HC recalled.

Dismissing Shashikiran’s petition as having no merit, the HC said, “In my view, the power to grant exemption would lie within the domain of the State Government and the power of the State Government to permit running of a Pharmacy unit within the premises of its Hospital cannot be challenged by the rival trader.”