' The appeal captioned above emanates from the decision, dated 11th May, 1982 passed by the learned Presiding Officer, Punjab Labour Court No, 7, Gujranwala, whereby the grievance petition of the appellant for his re-instatement in service was dismissed.
2. The reason for which the services of the appellant were terminated was that his conductor's licence had been cancelled by a special Magistrate and without such a licence the appellant could not conduct any bus. There is force in the argument of the learned counsel for the appellant, that this is not necessary for the conductor appointed to work on the buses of the respondent to have a conductor's licence. The provision of issuing of licences to the conductors is contained in rule 103 of the Motor Vehicles Rules, 1969. Such licences are issued by the Regional Authority but according to section 71 of the Motor Vehicles Ordinance, 1965, the Regional Transport Authority has no jurisdiction in relation to the transport operated by the Road Transport Corporation. The said section reads as under :-
71. Transport authorities to have no Jurisdiction in respect of Motor Transport operated by the Corporation.-(l) The Corporation may operate motor transport on any route it may think fit, and where it so operates such transport, the Provincial' Transport Authority and a Regional Transport Authority shall, notwithstanding anything in this Ordinance, have no jurisdiction in relation to that transport."
' Thus, rule 103 of 1969 Rules regarding taking of conductor's licence for conducting buses of the Road Transport Corporation is not applicable. The appellant, therefore. Could act as a conductor even though his licence had been cancelled and his services for want of conductor's licence were wrongly terminated. The learned lower Court did not consider section 71 of West Pakistan Motor Vehicles Ordinance and thus fell in error in holding that without a conductor's licence the appellant was debarred from acting as conductor on the basis of the Corporation.
3. As upshot of the observations made above, I accept the appeal and setting aside the order of termination of services of the appellant and the impugned decision of the learned lower Court, direct the reinstatement of the appellant in service. As the legal point involved in the case was considerably intricate, I do not allow back benefits to the appellant.