S N DESHMUKH Vs. MEDICAL COUNCIL OF INDIA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) By this petition filed under Articles 226 and 227 ofthe Constitution the petitioners numbering four seek a writ or direction forsetting aside the elections of the Executive Committee including that of thePresident and Vice-President of the Medical Council of India which electionswere held on 4/03/1991. Another direction sought is that Medical Councilof India, the first respondent, to update its electoral roll in accordance with theprovisions of the Indian Medical Council Act, 1956 (for short 'the Act') andthen for holding of elections as per law. Yet another direction sought is thatrespondents 4,5,15 and 16 were not entitled to participate in the activities ofthe first respondent as they had ceased to be members of the Council of thefirst respondent by operation of law. Two more directions are also sought :(1) for setting aside the minutes dated 4/03/1991 of the General BodyMeeting of the Medical Council of the first respondent, and (2) for setting asidethe minutes of the Executive Committee of the date 20/08/1991 andGeneral Body Meetings of the dates 21 and 22/08/1991 of the first respondent. Since the minutes of the meetings of these dates had not been filed alongwith the petition, prayers thereto, therefore, were neither pressed nor could begranted.There are as many as 18 respondents to the petition. First respondent,as noted above, is the Medical Council of India (for short 'the Medical Council')which is constituted by the Central Government under Section 3 of the Act andperforms various functions and duties under the Act. The second and thirdrespondents are respectively the President and Vice President of the MedicalCouncil. Respondents 4 to 16 are those against whom it is alleged that eitherthey were wrongly included or excluded as members of the Medical Council.Respondent No. 17 was acting as Administrator under the orders of the Courtin an earlier writ petition (C.W. 1003/90 decided on 21/11/1990).Respondent No. 18 is Union of India through the Secretary, Ministry of Healthand Family Welfare.

(2.) Before we proceed to deal with the contentions of the petitioners, itwill be appropriate to set out certain provisions of the Act dealing with theconstitution and composition of the Medical Council (Section 3), the mode ofelection (Section 4), restrictions on nomination and membership (Section 5),incorporation of the Medical Council (Section 6), and the term of office ofPresident, Vice President and the Members of the Medical Council (Section 7):

(3.) Section 8 of the Act provides for meetings of the Medical Counciland Section 9 for constitution of various committees and servants of the MedicalCouncil. The Executive Committee under Section 10 consists of President,Vice-President, who are the ex officio members, and not less than seven and notmore than eight other members elected from the Medical Council from amongstits members. We are not concerned in this writ petition with various functionswhich the Medical Council or its Committees are to perform though we notethat Medical Council is a high powered body looking after the medical education in the country.