Patna High Court
Tarak Chaudhary vs Indian Oil Corporation Limited on 17 February, 2026
Author: Harish Kumar
Bench: Harish Kumar
IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT PATNA
Letters Patent Appeal No.950 of 2025
In
Civil Writ Jurisdiction Case No.17933 of 2017
======================================================
Tarak Chaudhary, son of Late Saryug Chaudhary, resident of Village-
Bhusahi, P.O.- Beladam, P.S.- Baligoan, District- Vaishali.
... ... Appellant/s
Versus
1. Indian Oil Corporation Limited at Maurya Lok Complex, Patna-800001,
through its General Manager.
2. The Chief Divisional Retail Sales Manager, Indian Oil Corporation Limited,
Patna Divisional Office, Patna.
3. The Deputy General Manager Retail Sales, Marketing Division, Indian Oil
Corporation Limited, Patna
... ... Respondent/s
======================================================
Appearance :
For the Appellant/s : Mr. Akshansh Shanker, Advocate
For the Respondent/s : Mr. Ankit Katriar, Advocate
======================================================
CORAM: HONOURABLE THE CHIEF JUSTICE
and
HONOURABLE MR. JUSTICE HARISH KUMAR
ORAL JUDGMENT
(Per: HONOURABLE THE CHIEF JUSTICE)
Date : 17-02-2026
This Letters Patent Appeal has been filed by the
appellant Tarak Chaudhary challenging the order dated
18.08.2025
passed by the learned Single Judge in C.W.J.C. No.
17933 of 2017, in dismissing the writ petition filed by the
appellant.
2. The writ petition was filed seeking for following
reliefs:
“(i) Issuance of direction, order or
writ in the nature of Certiorari quashing the letter
dated 16.09.2017 (Annexure-4 to this writ
Patna High Court L.P.A No.950 of 2025 dt.17-02-2026
2/16application) issued by the respondent no.3, by
which the candidature of the petitioner was not
found to be eligible for K.S.K. dealership.
(ii) Issuance of direction, order or
writ restraining the respondents to allot the K.S.K.
dealership on the location for which the petitioner
was selected vide letter dated 10.02.2017
(Annexure-3 to this writ application) issued by the
respondent no.2 in draw of lots, during the
pendency of the present writ application.
(iii) Any other relief/reliefs for which
the petitioner may be found to be entitled in the
facts and circumstances of the present case.”
3. It is the case of the appellant-writ petitioner that
Indian Oil Corporation Limited (hereinafter referred to as ‘the
Corporation’) issued an Advertisement in the daily Newspaper
on 22.10.2014 for selection of Kishan Seva Kendra (in short
‘K.S.K.’). The appellant on being found eligible applied for the
dealership under S.C. Category and submitted all the required
documents. After submission of such application form, the Land
Evaluation Committee of the Corporation inspected the offered
land and also perused the documents pertaining to the lease deed
and other supporting documents and found the petitioner
eligible for K.S.K. dealership. In the light of the inspection
conducted, the Corporation vide letter dated 19.01.2017
Patna High Court L.P.A No.950 of 2025 dt.17-02-2026
3/16
informed the appellant that he had been qualified for draw of
lots for selection of the K.S.K. dealership and requested him to
remain present personally in the office of the Corporation on
10.02.2017. The petitioner accordingly ensured his presence at
the venue and in the draw of lots for selection of the R.O.
dealership, the petitioner was selected for the location on which
he applied. However, subsequently vide letter dated 16.09.2017,
the petitioner was informed that his candidature was found to be
ineligible for K.S.K. dealership on the ground that there is no
sub-lease clause in the Lease Agreement for the offered plot.
The petitioner submitted his representation before the
Corporation stating therein that the word ‘lc yht’ has been
written as ‘”k;yht’ and there is a provision for rectification of
the documents and, therefore, he may be permitted to rectify the
same. However, the representation of the petitioner came to be
rejected. According to the writ petitioner-appellant, the
rejection of the representation suffers from non-application of
mind, besides the Corporation with an ulterior motive has
decided not to grant license to the petitioner and, therefore, the
action is illegal, arbitrary and malafide.
4. On being noticed, counter affidavit was filed on
behalf of the Corporation, who were respondents no. 1 to 3 in
Patna High Court L.P.A No.950 of 2025 dt.17-02-2026
4/16
the writ petition stating as follows:
“8. That the Brochure contained
terms of selection which included a condition that
for location applicant had to offer land on
ownership or long terms lease and in case of
location reserved for SC category the applicant
in case of own land was required to offer the land
to the IOCL on lease or in case of land being on
lease, the applicant had to have a provision for
sub lease by the applicant to the Oil Company.
Any eligibility was to be attained on or prior to
the date of submission of Application and on the
basis of offer of land, the applicants were to be
categorised Group 1 or 2.
9. That the petitioner also applied
for the dealership at the subject location and
offered a land plot taken on lease vide lease deed
dated 17.11.2014.
10. That it is stated that admittedly
among several applicants, the draw was held on
10.02.2017 and the petitioner was selected
subject to verification of information and
credentials furnished at the time of application as
is evident from Annexure 3 to the writ petition.
11. That after selection, the
information, documents etc. were examined
carefully and verified and then it was found that
the Lease deed dated 17.11.2014 had no sub
lease clause which was in violation of the terms
of the selection as provided in the Brochure.
Hence the candidature of the petitioner was
Patna High Court L.P.A No.950 of 2025 dt.17-02-2026
5/16cancelled and the petitioner was accordingly
informed vide letter dated 16.9.2017. The
petitioner was advised that if he so desires, he
may file a representation within 10 days.
12. That admittedly the petitioner
filed a representation contained in Annexure 5 to
the writ petition. The petitioner raised that the
Lease Deed dated 17.11.14 had a sub lease
clause but inadvertently the word sub-lease was
written ‘Shaya-lease’. He further mentioned that
in the application he had written ‘yes’ in response
to query in the application about his willingness
to transfer the land to the Oil Company on
sale/long. He also relied the Clause 14 H and
said that he was ready to rectify the deed.
13. That the representation was duly
considered by the competent authority and then
the answering respondent arrived at conclusion
that the cancellation of petitioner’s candidature
was correct and hence intimated the petitioner
that the cancellation of petitioner’s candidature
was in line with the prevailing dealership
selection guidelines.
14. That it is stated that the Oil
Corporation spends a huge amount of money on
establishment of Retail Outlet under SC category.
Hence there is requirement of a sub lease clause
in the lease deed. Mere expression in the
application that the applicant is ready to transfer
the land to the company does not fulfill the
requirement of express sublease clause in the
Patna High Court L.P.A No.950 of 2025 dt.17-02-2026
6/16lease deed when it is a term of eligibility. Further,
from plain reading of the lease deed it is clear
that there is no sub lease clause and the word
shaya-lease does not mean in any way in the
context of the recitals of the deed to be sub lease.
Any rectification /modification in the lease deed
shall be effective from the date of rectification
whereas the applicant has to be eligible in all
respect on the date of submission of application
and eligibility attained after submission of
application is not to be considered.”
5. The petitioner filed a rejoinder affidavit to such
counter affidavit wherein it is stated as follows:
9. That from perusal of the reply of
the respondent corporation it appears that the
contention of the petitioner has been turned down
without any cogent reason as to why the
grievances as stated in the representation dated
25.09.2017 with respect to consideration of his
candidature as he was ready to submit rectified
lease deed as per the requirement not considered.
Further also the clause 4(vi) b of the applicable
guidelines only states that if the offered land is on
long term lease, then the agreement should have a
provision to sub-lease the land wherever the
locations are advertised under Corpus Fund
Scheme (CFS), other Corporation Owned sites
(“A”/ “CC” sites) and company lease sites. It
does not say that the rectified lease deed will not
be accepted if any mistake has been made in
Patna High Court L.P.A No.950 of 2025 dt.17-02-2026
7/16
incorporating the sub-lease clause. Therefore, the
non-consideration of the representation of the
petitioner for consideration of his candidature was
wholly illegal, arbitrary and without application
of mind.
xx xx xx
11. That it is reiterated that once the
petitioner has stated “Yes” in the application
about his willingness of the transfer the land to the
Oil Company on sale /long term lease then if there
was any mistake in the lease deed ascertaining the
sub-lease clause then as per clause 14 H viii of the
applicable brochure he should have been
permitted to submit a rectified lease deed with the
sub-lease clause contained therein.
12. That it is relevant to state that the
petitioner has taken the land on lease only with a
purpose to be selected as a dealer of the
respondent corporation in response to the
advertisement made by the corporation and thus,
he has accordingly spent huge amount of money
on taking the land on registered lease. Further,
there was no occasion at all, for the petitioner to
leave out the sub lease clause from the lease deed.
However, due to inadvertence by the deed writer,
Shaya lease had been typed instead of sub-lease
and also because of no prescribed format given by
the corporation for the lease deed containing the
sub lease clause, this mistake had occurred which
is a rectifiable deficiency and presently also in all
the dealer selection the absence of sub-lease
Patna High Court L.P.A No.950 of 2025 dt.17-02-2026
8/16
clause has been classified as rectifiable deficiency
and 21 days’ time is granted to rectify the lease
deed by incorporating the sub lease clause.
13. That in view of the above facts,
the petitioner should not be discriminated and
given an opportunity to rectify the mistake in the
lease deed which is a rectifiable deficiency and
accordingly after submitting the same rectified
lease deed within time be declared the selected
candidate and issued LOI accordingly.”
6. The learned Single Judge after hearing the parties
and going through the pleadings has been pleased to hold as
follows:
12. Further, the Learned counsel for
the respondent submitted that the cancellation of
the petitioner’s candidature was valid, justified,
and in conformity with the prescribed guidelines.
No illegality can be attributed to the same.
13. In support of the case of the
respondent Corporation, the Learned counsel has
relied on the following judgments of the Division
Bench of this Court reported in (1) 2012 (2) PLJR
783 (M/s Indian Oil Corporation Limited Vs. Raj
Kumar Jha & ors), (2) 2019(3) PLJR 1042 (The
Indian Oil Corporation & Ors. Vs. The Rupesh
Kumar Verma) and order passed in LPA No. 925
of 2012 (Mukesh Pandey Vs. The Hindustan
Petroleum Corporation & Ors.).
14. The observations made by the
Patna High Court L.P.A No.950 of 2025 dt.17-02-2026
9/16Hon’ble Division Bench in M/s Indian Oil
Corporation Limited (supra) are quoted
hereinbelow:
“8. We are of the opinion that
the Corporation being the State within the
meaning of Article 12 of the Constitution is
supposed to act fairly, reasonably and
uniformly and has to be objective in its
approach. Once the standard is set out in
the advertisement, the Corporation has to
adhere to the said standard without any
variation. In case, the Corporation allows
any alteration the same will amount to
subjective approach which is frowned upon
by the Courts time and again. To remain
objective the Corporation is required to
adhere to the standards mentioned in the
advertisement. In the present case, it is not
in dispute that the application made by the
writ petitioner was not in conformation with
the requirements mentioned in the
advertisement. In our opinion, the
Corporation was justified in rejecting the
application of the writ petitioner.
9. The Learned Single Judge
ought not to have interfered with the
decision of the Corporation which was
taken in consonance with the terms and
conditions contained in the advertisement.
Besides; may be, in the present case it was a
mere typographical error. However, there
Patna High Court L.P.A No.950 of 2025 dt.17-02-2026
10/16might be a case of mischief or
misrepresentation also. It is difficult to draw
a line where an error ends and a mischief or
misrepresentation begins. The best way to
avoid discrimination is strict adherence to
the standards mentioned in the
advertisement. For the aforesaid reasons we
hold that the Corporation was justified in
rejecting the application of the writ
petitioner. The Appeal is allowed. The
impugned judgment and order dated 28th
January, 2010 passed by the Learned Single
Judge in CWJC No. 13196 of 2009 is set
aside. CWJC No. 13196 is dismissed.”
15. Further the Hon’ble Division
Bench of this Court in The Indian Oil
Corporation & Ors. (supra) has held as follows:
“We have considered the
submissions raised and we find that the
advertisement categorically prescribes that
a candidate would be rendered ineligible if
the information given amounts to
withholding or cancealing any fact or
tendering of an incorrect information or a
false information that would result in
affecting the eligibility of the candidate. The
three categories which have been
specifically provided have, therefore, to be
read as indicated therein and, in our
considered opinion, any incorrect
information would affect the eligibility of a
Patna High Court L.P.A No.950 of 2025 dt.17-02-2026
11/16
candidate. In the instant case, it is admitted
on record that the information given by the
respondent-petitioner with regard to the plot
of the land and khata number in the
application form was an incorrect
information and was, therefore, a wrong
information. The plot number and the khata
number was 123 and 356 respectively. This
mistake was accepted by the respondent-
petitioner himself when he tendered the
rectification deed on 12th of June, 2018 long
after the expiry of the last date of the
application form. There is a substantial
variation in the number of khata and the
plot that was subsequently tendered as
Khata No. 300 with Plot No. 122 and the
same, in our opinion, is not such an error
which can be termed as a typographical
error at least in the application form of the
respondent- petitioner. The error may have
occurred in the deed for which the
respondent-petitioner is clearly responsible
and this stands admitted by him in view of
the rectification deed tendered later on.
Consequently, the information as contained
in the application form and the deed which
was filed along with the same palpably gave
an incorrect information with regard to the
khata and the plot number. This therefore
disentitled the respondent-petitioner from
being treated as an eligible candidate. The
Patna High Court L.P.A No.950 of 2025 dt.17-02-2026
12/16
conclusion drawn by the Learned Single
Judge bereft of these facts therefore cannot
stand the scrutiny of law. Shri K. D.
Chatterji, Learned Senior Counsel for the
appellants is, therefore, correct in his
submission that the Division Bench
Judgement as relied upon by the appellants
in the case of Indian Oil Corporation Ltd. v.
Raj Kumar Jha (supra) squarely applies on
the facts of the present case.”
16. In light of the legal proposition
laid down in the aforesaid judgments, this Court is
of the considered view that once a standard is set
out in the advertisement, the Corporation is bound
to adhere to the said standard without any
variation. In case, if the Corporation permits any
alteration, it would amount to a subjective
approach, which has been disapproved by the
Courts time and again. In the present case, the
petitioner through her application form, offered
unsuitable land for retail outlet dealership, based
on the selection criteria stipulated in the Unified
Guidelines for Selection of Dealership, which was
rightly rejected by the respondents.
17. Therefore, the petitioner cannot
claim any right for consideration of her
application. This Court finds no error or
irregularity in the decision of the respondents in
issuing rejection letter (Annexure-8) to the
petitioner.
7. It is the contention of the learned counsel for the
Patna High Court L.P.A No.950 of 2025 dt.17-02-2026
13/16
appellant that the learned Single Judge while holding that the
Corporation is bound by the standard set out in the
Advertisement failed to appreciate Clause 14 H (viii) of the
Selection brochure, which has been annexed to the counter
affidavit as Annexure-R/1. The captioned Advertisement
prescribing terms and conditions for selection and appointment
clearly acknowledged for acceptance of rectified or additional
documents provided they were pertaining to the information
mentioned in the application form.
The learned counsel for the appellant further
contended that by filing representation, the appellant requested
the Corporation to allow him to rectify the defect, as in the
column no. 9 of the application form, it has been specifically
indicated “Yes” to a query made therein that “are you willing to
transfer the land on sale/long lease to Oil Company”. Hence, the
representation should not have been rejected in a mechanical
and arbitrary manner without considering the grievances raised
by the appellant. It is further argued that the decision of the
Corporation is contrary to Clause 14 H(viii) of the Selection
brochure governing the procedure for rectification of mistake in
selection and terms of appointment.
8. The learned counsel for the Corporation on the
Patna High Court L.P.A No.950 of 2025 dt.17-02-2026
14/16
other hand supported the impugned order and placed reliance
upon the decision of a Division Bench of this Court in the case
of M/s Indian Oil Corporation Limited Vs. Raj Kumar Jha &
Ors, reported in, 2012 (2) PLJR 783, wherein it is observed as
follows:
“8. We are of the opinion that
the Corporation being the State within the
meaning of Article 12 of the Constitution is
supposed to act fairly, reasonably and
uniformly and has to be objective in its
approach. Once the standard is set out in
the advertisement, the Corporation has to
adhere to the said standard without any
variation. In case, the Corporation allows
any alteration, the same will amount to
subjective approach which is frowned upon
by the Courts time and again. To remain
objective, the Corporation is required to
adhere to the standards mentioned in the
advertisement. In the present case, it is not
in dispute that the application made by the
writ petitioner was not in conformation with
the requirements mentioned in the
advertisement. In our opinion, the
Corporation was justified in rejecting the
application of the writ petitioner.”
9. There is no dispute that when the advertisement
was issued, the interested applicants were advised to go through
Patna High Court L.P.A No.950 of 2025 dt.17-02-2026
15/16
the selection brochure for getting acquainted with the terms and
conditions of selection and appointment, which, inter alia,
included a condition that for location, the applicant had to offer
the land on ownership or long term lease. In case of location
reserved for SC Category, the applicant in case of own land was
required to offer the land to IOCL on lease or in case of land
being on lease, the applicant had to have a provision for sub-
lease by the application to the Oil Company. Such an eligibility
has to be attained on or prior to the date of submission of the
application and on the basis of such offer of land, the applicants
are to be categorised under Group-1 or 2.
10. There is no dispute that in the application form,
the petitioner placed the lease deed dated 17.11.2014, but there
is nothing in it regarding the sub-lease; it was written as ‘Shaya-
lease’. It is also not in dispute that the Corporation spends huge
amount of money on establishment of Retail Outlet under the
SC Category and, therefore, the requirement of Sub-lease clause
in the lease deed is of utmost relevance. When the Corporation
has come to the conclusion that mere expression in the
application that the applicant is ready to transfer the land to the
Corporation does not fulfill the requirement of express Sub-
lease clause in the lease deed; which is missing in the lease deed
Patna High Court L.P.A No.950 of 2025 dt.17-02-2026
16/16
itself and moreover any rectification or modification in the lease
deed is to be made effective from the date of rectification and
more so the requirement is that the applicant has to be eligible in
all respect on the date of submission of the application and that
the eligibility attended after submission of the application is not
to be considered, we are of the humble view that the
Corporation has not committed any illegality in rejecting the
representation submitted by the appellant.
11. Having perused the impugned judgment/order
of the learned Single Judge, we found nothing perverse or
palpable illegality or unreasonableness in it, especially when the
scope of Letters Patent Appeal is within a narrow compass and
it is a corrective jurisdiction only used to correct error and
hence, we are not inclined to interfere with the impugned order.
12. Accordingly, the Letters Patent Appeal being
devoid of merits, stands dismissed.
(Sangam Kumar Sahoo, CJ)
(Harish Kumar, J)
uday/-
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