One State Authority and several Regional Authorities: the law behind every bus permit in Kerala

Background

The statewide private bus strike called for 3 November was dropped after the operators met the Transport Minister, with the government agreeing to look at raising the permitted operating life of a bus from 22 years to 25. Permits and operating conditions for buses are not matters of custom but of statute. Section 68 of the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988 requires every State Government to set up, by notification in the Official Gazette, a State Transport Authority for the whole State. The same section requires it to set up Regional Transport Authorities, each for an area that the notification names as a region. The State Transport Authority holds the powers and functions listed in sub-section (3) of that section. In Kerala these bodies, and the Motor Vehicles Department under them, decide who may run a stage carriage and on what route. The Act is central law, so the same structure of a State Authority with Regional Authorities under it runs in every State.