PINKY SHIVRAJ SHAH Vs. STATE OF CHHATTISGARH

JUDGEMENT

(1.) In these two writ petitions filed by the President and Vice President of Janpad Panchayat Nagri, District Dhamtari, the petitioners have called in question the proceedings of the motion of no confidence drawn by the Collector, Dhamtari and have sought quashment of the notice dated 24.12.2018 and the order dated 28.12.2018 convening the meeting of the Janpad Panchayat for considering the motion of no confidence brought against the petitioners.

(2.) Challenge is mainly on the ground that when the application was moved on 21.12.2018 the Collector issued a memo to the Chief Executive Officer Janpad Panchayat Nagri for verification of signatures of 20 members of the Janpad Panchayat who had submitted the motion. However, the Chief Executive Officer, in turn, issued a memo to the Vikas Vistar Adhikari, Janpad Panchayat Nagri for verification of signatures. Such delegation has been attacked as not permissible in law.

(3.) It is also argued that in the memo issued by the Collector on 24.12.2018, it is clearly mentioned that out of 20 members of Janpad Panchayat signatures of only 6 could be verified and the remaining 14 were not available in their residence, therefore, till this moment the required one third numbers of members desiring to bring no confidence motion were not verified, however, another report was submitted by the Chief Executive Officer on the same date to the effect that signatures have been tallied. Thereafter, the Collector wrote the second note sheet on the same date and on this occasion the Collector did not refer to the verification made by the Chief Executive Officer by tallying the signatures on the application from the signatures available in the register of the Janpad Panchayat. It is further argued that by not referring the memo of the Chief Executive Officer dated 24.12.2018 the Collector has, in fact, took a 'u' turn as there was no personal satisfaction either by the CEO or by the Collector about the signatures.