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Synopsis

The Bombay High Court on Thursday reserved its order in a Public Interest Litigation filed seeking the issuance of guidelines to curb black marketing and ticket scalping at major events.

A division bench of the high court comprising Chief Justice Devendra Upadhyaya and Justice Amit Borkar reserved its order after hearing the petitioner.

Senior Advocate Janak Dwarkadas appearing for the petitioner argued that many countries have introduced laws for scalping and the petitioner also filed a complaint with the EOW.

“Before the public can acquire a ticket by reason bots all tickets are picked up within seconds by a secondary seller. Simultaneously, tickets are sold at the same time on the secondary website. Not a single member of the public can access the ticket. This will happen in every major event. Australia has bought into law for major events that deal with this fraud. In the UK they are investigating the respondent. In America also they are being investigated for scalping. Therefore, we filed with the Economic Offense Wing. Entertainment duty is collected. In future how will they regulate that public is not cheated,” Dwarkadas said.

The PIL filed by Advocate Amit Vyas argues that the practice of ticket scalping and hoarding violates the fundamental rights of the public under Article 14, Article 15(2), Article 19, and Article 21 of the Constitution.

“The practice of ticket scalping and hoarding violates the fundamental rights of the public under Article 14 (Right to Equality), Article 15(2)(Right of access to public entertainment), Article 19(Freedom of speech and expression) and Article 21 (Right to Life and Liberty) of the constitution. The current lack stringent laws and regulation allows discriminatory practices in access to public events, where genuine consumers are denied equal opportunity to purchase tickets to public entertainment,” the plea states.

The bench said that the petitioner was asking the court to legislate on the issue which was the domain of legislature.

“You are asking us to issue direction to govt to take cognizance. You are asking us to do something which is the prism of the legislature. You have the remedy to lodge an FIR. You also have a remedy under the consumer protection act. You are asking to issue directions to create a regime. That is part of policymaking. After all, it is private entertainment,” the bench said.

After hearing the petitioner, the bench reserved its orders.