MOHMED JAVID ABDULMUTLIB PIRZADA Vs. STATE OF GUJARAT

JUDGEMENT

(1.) By way of this Letters Patent Appeal under Clause 15 of the Letters Patent Act, the appellants - original petitioners have assailed the order of the learned Single Judge dtd. 12/4/2022 passed in Special Civil Application No.18140 of 2021.

(2.) The background of the facts which has given rise to filing of present Letters Patent Appeal is that election of Agriculture Produce Markets Committee, Vankaner (hereinafter referred to as "the APMC, Vankaner) had been notified by Director of APMC on 13/10/2021 in view of Rule 4 of the APMC Rules, 1965. The the Director by such declaration has specified the various stages of election programme including the stage of preparation of voters list and casting of votes and declaration of result. Simultaneously, one Mr. J. M. Mehta, Co-operative Officer, Grade-II (Industry) had been appointed as an Authorized Officer who is attached to the office of District Registrar, Co-operative Society, Morbi. By virtue of Rule 7 of the APMC Rules, every co-operative society dispensing agricultural credit in the market area shall communicate the full names of members of its managing committee together with the place of residence of each members and the last date for sending such particulars was prescribed as 24/10/2021. On the basis of such material being supplied, the APMC, Vakaner has prepared a voter list in view of Sec. 11 of the APMC Act and forwarded the same to the Authorized Officer.

(3.) Looking to the urgency of the situation and the specific request having been made by both the learned advocates and in view of the initial order passed on 18/4/2022, we accepted the request of learned advocates for hearing and disposal of present Letters Patent Appeal. Accordingly, we have heard Mr. Bharat T. Rao, learned advocate appearing for the appellants, Mr. Jay B. Trivedi, learned advocate appearing for the respondent No.4, Mr. Sahil Trivedi, learned Assistant Government Pleader appearing for respondent State and Mr. B. S. Patel, learned senior counsel who stated to have been specially appointed to represent the authority.