Nobody has a fundamental right to a public holiday: Bombay High Court
Public holidays are a matter of public policy and cannot be availed as a matter of violation of fundamental rights as the Bombay High Court rightfully observed that in the writ petition impugning the notification issued in October 2021 that did not declare 02.08.2022 as a public holiday and directing the respondent to issue a notification every year to declare 2nd August of every year as a public holiday celebrating the liberation of Dadra and Nagar Haveli by the division bench of Justice Gautam Patel and Justice Madhav Jamdar in the case of KISHNABHAI NATHUBHAI GHUTIA &amp; Anr V. THE HON’BLE ADMINISTRATOR UNION TERRITORY &amp; Ors [WRIT PETITION NO. 9602 OF 2021] In the present case the petitioner sought relief to get August 2 of every year to be declared as a public holiday because it marks the liberation of Dadra and Nagar Haveli and it was permitted as a public holiday from 1954 to 2020. Comparisons were drawn by the petitioner between Independence Day i.e., 15th August and how it is similar to the independence of Dadra and Nagar Haveli. References were also made to the 2019 order of Bombay High Court Division Bench that declared Good Friday as a gazetted holiday that was also applicable to Union Territory of Daman and Diu and Dadra and Nagar Haveli to which the court stated that considering both the cases stand on different footings, they cannot declare 2nd August as a Public Holiday. The Bombay High Court here observed that in this case there is no legally enforceable right that can be said to be infringed as Public Holiday is nobody’s Fundamental right and during these times, we should rather focus on reducing the number of public holidays and not increasing them and rejected the petition seeing no substance. Public holidays are a matter of government policy and we should not think of claiming them as a matter of right, it should be totally left to the government whether to declare a particular day as a public holiday or not except for 3 days that are Independence Day that is on 15th August, Republic Day on 26th January and Gandhi Jayanti that is on 2nd October because these 3 days have statutory backing as they are gazetted holidays. If we start to recognize every occasion as a holiday then there will be far too many holidays. India is a very diverse country with a vast population and a very large territory, while it is important to value everyone’s sentiments, it is not feasible to give out a public holiday for every occasion. Moreover, these petitions requesting a direction to get a certain day declared as a public holiday has no legal backing under any act. There are many ways of celebrating a special occasion and it is not necessary that you have to take an off on that particular day and neither does not declaring the day as a leave deprives anyone of the right to celebrate the special occasion as no right is absolute in nature.
25 ASWP 9602 2021.DOC IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT BOMBAY CIVIL APPELLATE JURISDICTION WRIT PETITION NO. 9602 OF 2021 Kishnabhai Nathubhai Ghutia & Anr The Hon’ble Administrator Union Territory & Mr Bhavesh Parmar with Devmani Shukla Rajesh Sahani & Reshma Nair i b Devmani Shukla for the Petitioners Mr Saurabh Kshirsagar i b H Venegavkar for the Respondents CORAM G.S. Patel Madhav J. Jamdar JJ 5th January 2022 The Writ Petition seeks the following reliefs Rule be issued Digitally signed by For a writ or an order in the nature of a writ declaring that the impugned notification issued in the month of October 2021 declaring public holidays for year 2022 is bad and illegal to the limited extent of not declaring as public holiday 02.08.2022 which is the Liberation Independence Day of Dadra & Nagar Haveli 5th January 2022 25 ASWP 9602 2021.DOC For a writ or an order in the nature of writ directing the respondents to issue a notification this yearand every year hereinafter declaring 02 August of each year as public holiday for the purpose of celebrating the Liberation Independence Day of Dadra & Nagar Haveli Pending hearing and final disposal of the present Writ Petition for an order of this Hon’ble Court directing the respondents to issue a notification this yearand every year hereinafter declaring 02 August of each year as public holiday for the purpose of celebrating the Liberation Independence Day of Dadra & Nagar Haveli.” 2nd August 1954 was the date when the Union Territories of Dadra and Nagar Haveli gained “Liberation Independence” from Portuguese rule and became part of the territory of India. From 1954 to 2020 2nd August was permitted as a public holiday on account of Liberation or Independence. This was discontinued on 29th July It is submitted that if other similar date as 15th August can be declared as public holiday for national Independence then there is no reason why 2nd August should not be declared a public holiday for Dadra & Nagar Haveli Our attention is drawn to an order passed on 15th April 2019 of a Division Bench of this Court. That also pertained to Union Territories of Dadra and Nagar Haveli. Good Friday was then listed as a restricted i.e. an optional holiday but not a gazetted holiday The argument was that there was that taking into account the population of Christians in the area it was decided not to declared 5th January 2022 25 ASWP 9602 2021.DOC Good Friday as a gazetted holiday. Observing that Christmas and similar holidays are widely celebrated the Division Bench disposed of the PIL by directing the Administrator to declare Good Friday as a gazetted holiday in the Union Territories of Diu Daman Dadra and Nagar Haveli. That order stands on a different footing from the present case. That PIL was about the failure to gazette i.e. make compulsory a public holiday rather than keep it optional. 6. Whether or not to declare a particular day as a public holiday or an optional holiday or no holiday at all is as a matter of government policy. There is no legally enforceable right that can be said to have been infringed. Nobody has a fundamental right to a public holiday. As it is we have far too many public holidays in this country. Perhaps the time has come to reduce not increase the number of public holidays. 7. We do not see any substance in the Petition. It is rejected There will be no order as to costs All concerned will act on production of a digitally signed copy of this order Madhav J. Jamdar J 5th January 2022