Madras High Court dismisses as withdrawn a plea to declare ‘Vettri Payanam’ scheme unconstitutional

Image used for representation | Photo Credit: R. Ragu The Madras High Court on Monday (October 5, 2026) dismissed as withdrawn a writ petition filed by a private bus operator from Erode district, challenging the constitutional validity of the Tamil Nadu government’s ‘Vettri Payanam’ scheme, which provides for no-fare travel to 84.32 lakh women every day on 12,695 government buses across the State.The First Division Bench of Chief Justice Sushrut Arvind Dharmadhikari and Justice G. Arul Murugan, however, granted liberty to the petitioner, N. Kalamani, to work out other remedies available to her under the law. The petitioner’s counsel chose to withdraw the case after the judges wondered how she could challenge a scheme applicable to the entire State.According to the petitioner, she held permits to operate private buses on a 47-km route from Erode to Vellithiruppur and another 88-km route from Kakapalayam to Andhiyur. Hence, her prayer against the non-collection of fare from women passengers in government buses alone, much to the disadvantage of private operators, should have been confined to those two routes, the judges said.They also pointed out that the petitioner had challenged only an announcement made by Chief Minister C. Joseph Vijay under Rule 110 of the Tamil Nadu Legislative Assembly and a consequent release issued by the Information and Public Relations Department, but not a consequential government order issued for introduction of the ‘Vettri Payanam’ scheme from October 2, 2026.After the judges highlighted the flaws, the petitioner’s counsel chose to withdraw the writ petition, which had challenged the constitutional validity of the scheme, with liberty to file a fresh case. In her affidavit, Ms. Kalamani said, she was a widow who had two daughters to take care of. She had employed about 15 people, and their families, too, were dependant on her transport business.She feared that hardly any passenger would step onto her buses on the two routes as a significant number of government buses were operated along those routes. She said that the State government had come forward to spend a whopping amount of ₹6,000 crore a year for compensating the State transport corporations towards the Vettri Payanam scheme but had not extended the same to private buses.A request made by the Federation of Bus Operators Associations of Tamil Nadu to Chief Minister C. Joseph Vijay on July 22, 2026, for extending the scheme to private bus operators, too, did not yield the desired result, she said, and argued that selective implementation of the scheme with respect to government buses alone would cause a huge loss to private bus operators and force them to wind up their businesses. Published - October 05, 2026 01:12 pm IST