The Delhi High Court recently held that the business operation of the website and mobile app Rail Yatri is unauthorized and impermissible..The judgment was passed by a Single Judge Bench of Justice V Kameswar Rao in a batch of writ petitions by the operator of website Rail Yatri, Stelling Technologies Pvt Ltd and its shareholders. The petitions had challenged IRCTC’s move to block its operations..Pursuant to its monopoly over issuing railway e-tickets, IRCTC appointed several Principal Service Providers (PSPs) for the purpose of booking railway tickets on its web portal. Each PSP, in turn, had several hundred agents working under it as Retail Service Providers (RSPs). These RSPs, for the purpose of booking railway e-tickets on IRCTC, were provided with a unique identification number to access IRCTC..As per Rail Yatri, it was not in the business of actually booking railway tickets, but was merely an e-marketplace for potential buyers. Rail Yatri thus acted as a facilitator between an e-ticket booking passenger and authorized Retail Service Providers (RSPs), along with providing other value-added services..Every potential customer who used Rail Yatri was directed to an RSP. Eventually, an e-ticket could be booked using authorized booking credential/access code only through IRCTC’s booking engine/interface. For the same, Rail Yatri charged a nominal “market access fee” on the tickets..Problems arose when the Railway Police received a complaint that Rail Yatri was carrying on illegal booking. Meanwhile, a complaint was also registered, alleging that a customer who claimed to have booked a ticket from Rail Yatri did not receive any refund upon cancellation..Subsequently, IRCTC sent a notice to Rail Yatri, calling upon them to stop booking e-tickets and stop directing passengers to the RSPs. Furthermore, IRCTC not only complained to PayTm asking it to suspend their e-payment gateway services, but also unilaterally deactivated the access credentials of several RSPs associated with Rail Yatri’s e-tickets business. IRCTC also raised complaints with the Cyber Crime Cell..Before the High Court, Rail Yatri contended that IRCTC’s action was in gross violation of its fundamental rights guaranteed under Article 14, 19(1)(g) and 21 of the Constitution of India. Rail Yatri argued that being a government enterprise, IRCTC had a higher duty cast upon it to not act in an arbitrary manner..It was stated that Rail Yatri had been singled out for such coercive treatment whereas other digital platforms hosts like Google, Justdial, Sulekha, Quikr, which also provided similar lead generating services to authorized RSPs, continued to do so without any hindrance..IRCTC, on the other hand, contended that Rail Yatri’s business model was completely illegal and amounted to usurping, theft and misappropriating its property and goodwill..The Court was informed that as per IRCTC’s Rules and Regulations, a PSP/RSP could not share his ID/access credentials with any third person. This was done to ensure the integrity of the system being operated by IRCTC as well as to prevent misuse of any confidential information to the advantage of any third party..IRCTC justified blocking the operations of Rail Yatri on the ground that many of the RSPs associated with Rail Yatri were found sharing their access credentials for the purpose of booking tickets..Furthermore, IRCTC stated that merely because Rail Yatri was conducting its activity in compliance with the RBI Regulations relating to online payments, it would not confer any legitimacy on its operations which were not backed by the IRCTC Rules and Regulations..IRCTC also submitted that Rail Yatri was overcharging the customers using the nomenclature ‘convenience fee’ which is over and beyond the maximum permissible fee as has been fixed by the Ministry of Railways..Agreeing with IRCTC, the Court concluded that Rail Yatri’s business activity was impermissible..Proceeding on the premise that IRCTC has the exclusive right with regard to e-ticketing, the Court noted that there was no contract or arrangement between IRCTC and Rail Yatri for that purpose..“M/s Stelling which has a platform railyatri.in is neither a PSP nor an RSP and has no privity of contract with IRCTC. No money has been paid by M/s Stelling to IRCTC / PSP to be involved in the process of e-ticket booking or to be integrated in the network initiated / developed by the IRCTC, which according to this Court is a prerequisite to be involved in any manner in the process of e-ticketing and for which integration fee and Annual maintenance fee is required to be paid.”.With respect to the methodology of payment adopted by Rail Yatri, the Court stated that there was a deviation from the procedure as contemplated under the scheme evolved by the IRCTC..“…on a deeper consideration of the methodology evolved by M/s Stelling, through its platform railyatri.in connecting the customer to the RSPs and booking tickets by collecting money in its wallet and earning revenue, is surely unauthorized. No such arrangement is contemplated as per the Rules and Regulations / Policy.”.The Court also rejected objections under Article 19(6) by stating that there was no restriction imposed on Rail Yatri to carry out any business, trade or profession..“In fact, the petitioner M/s Stelling, if it chooses to carry out the trade of e-ticket booking, it can do so, subject to it fulfilling all the conditions that have been put by the IRCTC under the Rules and Regulations / Policy framed by it. But it cannot unauthorizedly do it, in terms of agreement with RSPs, by collecting the money itself.”.It thus dismissed the petitions filed by Stelling Technologies and others..Read the Judgment:.Image courtesy: YouTube.Bar & Bench is available on WhatsApp. For real-time updates on stories, Click here to subscribe to our WhatsApp.
The Delhi High Court recently held that the business operation of the website and mobile app Rail Yatri is unauthorized and impermissible..The judgment was passed by a Single Judge Bench of Justice V Kameswar Rao in a batch of writ petitions by the operator of website Rail Yatri, Stelling Technologies Pvt Ltd and its shareholders. The petitions had challenged IRCTC’s move to block its operations..Pursuant to its monopoly over issuing railway e-tickets, IRCTC appointed several Principal Service Providers (PSPs) for the purpose of booking railway tickets on its web portal. Each PSP, in turn, had several hundred agents working under it as Retail Service Providers (RSPs). These RSPs, for the purpose of booking railway e-tickets on IRCTC, were provided with a unique identification number to access IRCTC..As per Rail Yatri, it was not in the business of actually booking railway tickets, but was merely an e-marketplace for potential buyers. Rail Yatri thus acted as a facilitator between an e-ticket booking passenger and authorized Retail Service Providers (RSPs), along with providing other value-added services..Every potential customer who used Rail Yatri was directed to an RSP. Eventually, an e-ticket could be booked using authorized booking credential/access code only through IRCTC’s booking engine/interface. For the same, Rail Yatri charged a nominal “market access fee” on the tickets..Problems arose when the Railway Police received a complaint that Rail Yatri was carrying on illegal booking. Meanwhile, a complaint was also registered, alleging that a customer who claimed to have booked a ticket from Rail Yatri did not receive any refund upon cancellation..Subsequently, IRCTC sent a notice to Rail Yatri, calling upon them to stop booking e-tickets and stop directing passengers to the RSPs. Furthermore, IRCTC not only complained to PayTm asking it to suspend their e-payment gateway services, but also unilaterally deactivated the access credentials of several RSPs associated with Rail Yatri’s e-tickets business. IRCTC also raised complaints with the Cyber Crime Cell..Before the High Court, Rail Yatri contended that IRCTC’s action was in gross violation of its fundamental rights guaranteed under Article 14, 19(1)(g) and 21 of the Constitution of India. Rail Yatri argued that being a government enterprise, IRCTC had a higher duty cast upon it to not act in an arbitrary manner..It was stated that Rail Yatri had been singled out for such coercive treatment whereas other digital platforms hosts like Google, Justdial, Sulekha, Quikr, which also provided similar lead generating services to authorized RSPs, continued to do so without any hindrance..IRCTC, on the other hand, contended that Rail Yatri’s business model was completely illegal and amounted to usurping, theft and misappropriating its property and goodwill..The Court was informed that as per IRCTC’s Rules and Regulations, a PSP/RSP could not share his ID/access credentials with any third person. This was done to ensure the integrity of the system being operated by IRCTC as well as to prevent misuse of any confidential information to the advantage of any third party..IRCTC justified blocking the operations of Rail Yatri on the ground that many of the RSPs associated with Rail Yatri were found sharing their access credentials for the purpose of booking tickets..Furthermore, IRCTC stated that merely because Rail Yatri was conducting its activity in compliance with the RBI Regulations relating to online payments, it would not confer any legitimacy on its operations which were not backed by the IRCTC Rules and Regulations..IRCTC also submitted that Rail Yatri was overcharging the customers using the nomenclature ‘convenience fee’ which is over and beyond the maximum permissible fee as has been fixed by the Ministry of Railways..Agreeing with IRCTC, the Court concluded that Rail Yatri’s business activity was impermissible..Proceeding on the premise that IRCTC has the exclusive right with regard to e-ticketing, the Court noted that there was no contract or arrangement between IRCTC and Rail Yatri for that purpose..“M/s Stelling which has a platform railyatri.in is neither a PSP nor an RSP and has no privity of contract with IRCTC. No money has been paid by M/s Stelling to IRCTC / PSP to be involved in the process of e-ticket booking or to be integrated in the network initiated / developed by the IRCTC, which according to this Court is a prerequisite to be involved in any manner in the process of e-ticketing and for which integration fee and Annual maintenance fee is required to be paid.”.With respect to the methodology of payment adopted by Rail Yatri, the Court stated that there was a deviation from the procedure as contemplated under the scheme evolved by the IRCTC..“…on a deeper consideration of the methodology evolved by M/s Stelling, through its platform railyatri.in connecting the customer to the RSPs and booking tickets by collecting money in its wallet and earning revenue, is surely unauthorized. No such arrangement is contemplated as per the Rules and Regulations / Policy.”.The Court also rejected objections under Article 19(6) by stating that there was no restriction imposed on Rail Yatri to carry out any business, trade or profession..“In fact, the petitioner M/s Stelling, if it chooses to carry out the trade of e-ticket booking, it can do so, subject to it fulfilling all the conditions that have been put by the IRCTC under the Rules and Regulations / Policy framed by it. But it cannot unauthorizedly do it, in terms of agreement with RSPs, by collecting the money itself.”.It thus dismissed the petitions filed by Stelling Technologies and others..Read the Judgment:.Image courtesy: YouTube.Bar & Bench is available on WhatsApp. For real-time updates on stories, Click here to subscribe to our WhatsApp.
