KOCHI: The oil marketing companies on Monday filed appeals before the Kerala High Court challenging the single judge’s interim directive to sell high-speed diesel (HSD) to KSRTC at a price on a par with the existing market rate at retail outlets.
In the appeals, Bharat Petroleum Corporation and other companies contended that the single judge ought not have exercised its jurisdiction under Article 226 as it was a settled law that no interim order should be passed in such policy matters.
The price fixation is not the forte of the court and the scope of judicial review of non-statutory price fixation is extremely limited, they said. The single judge ought to have considered that the writ petition involves a contractual dispute between the parties and ought to have found that the writ petition is not maintainable in view of the alternative remedy of arbitration under the agreements.
The single judge ought not to have fixed the price at which a commodity, whether essential or otherwise, is supplied under a commercial contract. In fact, the KSRTC had voluntarily chosen to get supplies of HSD in bulk from the oil marketing companies by entering into a separate contractual agreement. Therefore, KSRTC could not seek claim to parity with retail consumers.