1 APHC010437372025 IN THE HIGH COURT OF ANDHRA PRADESH AT AMARAVATI MONDAY, THE TWENTY SECOND OF SEPTEMBER TWO THOUSAND AND TWENTY FIVE WRIT APPEAL NO: 976 of 2025 Bench Sr.No:-12 [3483] S. Ramalingadu, ...Appellant Vs. The State Of Andhra Pradesh and Others ...Respondent(s) ********** Advocate for Appellant: K SRINIVAS Advocate for Respondent: GP FOR CIVIL SUPPLIES CORAM : THE CHIEF JUSTICE DHIRAJ SINGH THAKUR SRI JUSTICE RAVI CHEEMALAPATI DATE : 22th September 2025 ORDER: (Per Sri Justice Ravi Cheemalapati) Feeling aggrieved by the orders dated 16.12.2024 passed in W.P.No.2530 of 2019, the petitioner in the said writ petition preferred this intra Court appeal under Clause 15 of the Letters Patent. 2. For convenience, the parties hereinafter will be referred to with their status in the writ petition. 2 3. The facts that led to filing of the writ appeal are that: (a) The petitioner was appointed as a dealer of fair price shop No.20 of Daivamdinne village, Yemmiganur Mandal, Kurnool District and has been distributing the essential commodities to the cardholders. While so, upon an inspection made by authorities on 06.10.2016 wherein certain variations were found in respect of stocks of PDS rice, sugar and kerosene and the charges were framed against the petitioner which runs as follows; Charge No.1: The dealer has not maintained prescribed timings for distribution of ECs to the cardholders. Charge No.2: The cardholders have not received K.Oil from the F.P Shop for the months of August and September 2016. Charge No.3: The dealer is distributing ECs to the cardholders for 5 to 6 days only. Charge No.4: The dealer has obtained LTIs of the cardholders for K.Oil, while distributing rice in advance and he has not distributed K.Oil to the cardholders. Charge No.5: The dealer has distributed the ECs with TIN instead of Electronic Weighment machine and thus the cardholders are getting lesser quantity of ECs. A show cause notice was issued to the petitioner to which he has submitted his explanation. In spite of submitting explanation, the 4th respondent(RDO) had cancelled the authorization of the petitioner to run fair price shop, as per clause 17(c) of A.P.State Public Distribution System (Control) Order, 2008 vide proceedings dated 12.06.2017. It appears from the said order dated 12.06.2017 that the charges framed against the petitioner 3 were proved. It was held that the petitioner, as a fair price shop dealer, had not maintained the Fair price shop properly. (b) Against the said order passed by the RDO, the petitioner/appellant herein had preferred an appeal before the Joint Collector in terms of Clause 20(2) of A.P.State Public Distribution System (Control) Order, 2008 and the same was dismissed confirming the cancellation orders. Aggrieved thereby, the petitioner filed revision before the District Collector, Kurnool against the orders passed by the Joint Collector which was also got dismissed. Assailing the same, the petitioner filed a writ petition vide W.P.No.2530 of 2019 which in turn got dismissed on 16.12.2024, as such, preferred the present writ appeal. 4. Heard Sri K.Srinivas, learned counsel for the appellant and learned Government Pleader for Civil Supplies. 5. Learned counsel for the petitioner/appellant herein while reiterating the grounds of appeal and contents of the writ affidavit submitted that, though the variations are minor, the 4th respondent authority had cancelled the authorisation of the petitioner, that too without proper enquiry as per Clause 5(5) of the A.P.State Public Distribution System (Control) Order, 2008. Though the said facts were brought to the notice of the learned single judge, the learned single judge had dismissed the writ petition. Further, the learned Single Judge failed to consider that, in view of the law declared, the Quasi- Judicial authority failed to conduct proper enquiry as per law. Therefore, if 4 the said cancellation order of the petitioner is not set aside, the petitioner shall be put to irreparable loss and hardship. Hence, the writ appeal. 6. On the other hand, learned Government Pleader while justifying the orders of the learned Single Judge as well as preliminary, appellate and revisional authorities contended that the said authorities have rightly considered and dismissed the petitioner’s case and the petitioner has not raised any valid ground warranting the interference of this Court and the writ appeal deserves dismissal and accordingly prayed to dismiss the present appeal. 7. Perused the record and considered the submissions made by both the learned counsel. 8. The Revenue Divisional Officer has cancelled the authorization of the petitioner’s (appellant herein) fair price shop under proceedings dated 12.06.2017 on the ground that the petitioner has committed certain irregularities and charges were proved against him. Assailing the same, an appeal was preferred before the Joint Collector, Kurnool District, which was dismissed upholding the orders of RDO dated 12.06.2017. Aggrieved thereby, the petitioner filed revision before the District Collector, Kurnool against the orders passed by the Joint Collector which was also got dismissed. Assailing the same, the petitioner filed a writ petition vide W.P.No.2530 of 2019 which in turn got dismissed on 16.12.2024. 5 9. As could be noticed from the record, the main grievance of the petitioner is that 4th respondent (RDO) had straight away passed cancellation orders only basing on the tahsildar’s report, without considering the explanation submitted by petitioner, without conducting an enquiry and without affording an opportunity of personal hearing to him. Accepting the case of the petitioner, it can safely be held that the 4th respondent grossly violated one of the principles of natural justice that no man can be condemned unheard. 10. Moreover, the power of RDO to impose penalties on fair price shop dealers is derived from sub-clause (5) of Clause 5 of the A.P.State Public Distribution System (Control) Order, 2008. The said provision reads as under: “The appointing authority may, at any time whether at the request of the authorized fair price shop dealer/nominated retailer/hawker or authorized establishment on suo motu after making such enquiry as may be deemed necessary and for reasons to be recorded in writing, add to, amend, vary, suspend or cancel the authorization issued or deemed to be issued to him under this clause.” The clause reproduced above enjoins on the appointing authority to follow two mandatory conditions before imposing any penalty as envisaged therein. The first, it shall make an ‘enquiry’ as deemed necessary; and the second, it shall record reasons in writing. As per the Oxford Dictionary, Thesaurus, Indian Edition – 2007, meaning of the word ‘enquiry’ includes probe, examine, explore, and delve into. The word ‘enquiry’ fell for judicial interpretation by the Apex Court in the context of service law jurisprudence. It 6 was held by Apex Court that enquiries must be conducted bona fide and care must be taken to see that they do not become empty formalities. 11. However, this Court is of the considered opinion that since an order of cancellation of fair price shop dealer visits the dealer with adverse consequences, the appointing authority must adhere to the fundamental ingredients of an enquiry. The enquiry need not be too elaborate as in the case of a disciplinary proceeding against a Government Servant, but it shall follow the basic requirement of an ‘enquiry’ which in our view must be as described infra. Further, an enquiry pre-supposes an opportunity of personal hearing including recording the sworn statement of the dealer and witnesses, if any, and in case where either card holders or other persons sent any compliant, they must also be examined in the presence of the dealer and also an opportunity of cross-examination shall be given to such persons. Further, the concerned authority has to supply all the reports to the dealer, on which he is likely to place reliance to the detriment of the dealer. In the present case, while cancelling the authorization of the petitioner, the RDO had relied on the report of the tahsildar dated 18.10.2016. Therefore, without adhering to such procedure, issuing orders in such a manner amounts to passing the orders behind the back of the dealer/petitioner. 12. Unfortunately, a perusal of the RDO’s order shows that he has not even attempted to hold an enquiry and he has allowed himself to be swayed away by the report of the Tahsildar, without trying to test the veracity of the explanation offered by the petitioner. The learned single judge erred in 7 appreciating the said aspects while dismissing the writ petition. As the respondent no.4 has not followed the said procedure and passed the order in violation of principles of natural justice, the said order vide proceedings Rc.M.4196/2017 dated 12.06.2017, cannot be sustained and the same is accordingly set-aside. Subsequently, the orders of the Joint Collector and the Collector dated 23.01.2018 & 24.01.2019 respectively, which confirmed the order of the respondent no.4-RDO are also set-aside. The matter is remitted back to the original primary authority for fresh consideration for conducting proper enquiry in the light of the observations made herein. With the above observations, the Writ Appeal is allowed. No costs. As a sequel, miscellaneous applications pending if any, shall stand closed. DHIRAJ SINGH THAKUR, CJ RAVI CHEEMALAPATI, J BRS