Section 15
SEC. 15. Subsections (g), as amended, and (h) of section seventeen of Act Numbered Twenty-three hundred and seven are hereby amended to read as follows: "(g) Hereafter, directly or indirectly, without previous authority of the Public Utility Commission, issue, give or tender any free ticket, free pass or free or reduced rate transportation for passengers, except to its officers, agents, employees, attorneys, physicians and surgeons, and members of their families; inmates of hospital or charity institutions, and persons exclusively engaged in charitable work; to indigent, destitute and homeless persons and to such persons when transported by charitable societies or hospitals, and the necessary agents employed in such transportation; to the necessary caretakers, going and returning, of live-stock, poultry, fruit, and other freight under uniform and non-discriminatory regulation; to employees of sleeping car corporations, express corporations, and telegraph and telephone corporations; railway and marine mail service employees, when traveling in the course of their official duty, post-office inspectors, customs officers 'and inspectors, and immigration inspectors when engaged in inspection; to witnesses attending any legal investigation in which the carrier is an interested party, persons injured in accidents or wrecks, and physicians and nurses attending such persons; to peace officers, to officers and men of regularly constituted municipal fire departments; but nothing herein contained shall prevent the entry into any public conveyance or in or upon the property of any such public utility as herein defined of any officer or employee of the Government of the Philippine Islands, or any political subdivision thereof, in the pursuit of his public duties. Nothing in this Act shall be construed to prevent the interchange between said public utilities and common carriers of passes or franks for their employees, officers, agents, surgeons, physicians, attorneys-at-law and their families. All public utilities engaged in the business of carrying passengers shall furnish transportation free of charge to the Public Utility Commissioner and the secretary and other employees of the Public Utility Commission when traveling on official business: Provided, however, That carriers by water, in furnishing such free passage, shall not be obliged to furnish subsistence free of charge, unless the object of the travel be such that the carrier is directly interested. "(h) Without the approval of the Public Utility Commission first had, to sell, alienate, mortgage, encumber or lease its property, franchises, privileges or rights, or any part thereof; nor merge or consolidate its property, franchises, privileges or rights, or any part thereof, with that of any other public utility as herein denned. The approval herein required shall be given, after notice to the public and after hearing the persons interested at a public hearing, if it be shown that there are just and reasonable grounds for making the sale, alienation, mortgage or encumbrance for liabilities of more than one year maturity, lease, merger, or consolidation to be approved, and that the same are not detrimental to the public interest, and in case of a sale, the date on which the same is to be consummated shall be fixed in the order of approval: Provided, however, That the sale, alienation, mortgage or encumbrance and lease of the property of public utilities which, on account of the nature and conditions of their business, are, in the judgment of the Commission, of little importance to the public interest, shall be exempt from the requisite of the approval of the Commission; but the public utilities shall in every case give notice of these transactions to the Commission. Any sale, alienation, mortgage or encumbrance, lease, fusion or consolidation made without the approval herein required shall be null and void: Provided, further, That nothing herein contained shall be construed to prevent the sale, alienation or lease by any public utility as herein defined of any of its property in the ordinary course of its business."