JAYRAM SAKHARAM PACHORE Vs. STATE OF MAHARASHTRA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS petition has challenged the virus of section 73-C (2-B), 73-A, 73-IB and 77-A (3) of the Maharashtra Co-operative Societies Act, 1960 (for short, the Act) and prayed for other consequential reliefs, including the continuation of the managing committee in office without being superseded or replaced by an Administrator till their elections are held and the newly elected body resumes office. On 2nd August, 1999 a Division Bench of this Court (Barde and Mhase, JJ.), while issuing notice before admission, granted ad interim relief in terms of prayer Clause (F) and also clarified that the petitioner would be at liberty to move the State Government as per the provisions of section 73-C (2) of the Act with an application for extension of the Managing Committees tenure. Prayer Clause (F) reads, thus :

(2.) BEFORE we proceed further it would be necessary to deal with some factual aspects regarding the present managing committee. Its term was to expire on 2nd August, 1999 and the Collector of Ahmednagar, who is the statutory authority to conduct the elections for the managing committee of the respondent No. 4 Sangh, which is a specified co-operative society within the meaning of section 73-C of the said Act, had declared provisional voters list on 4th June, 1999. Anticipating that the managing committee would have to vacate the office after 2nd August, 1999, by the operation of the provisions of section 73-C (2-B) of the Act, in the event of the elections to the new managing committee not being held, five of the fifteen managing committee members approached this Court in the instant petition on 14th June, 1999. A little prior to that i. e. on 8th June, 1999, the Government of Maharashtra issued an order, invoking its statutory powers under section 73-IB of the Act, to postpone the elections of all cooperative societies till 30th September, 1999 and pursuant to the general elections to the Legislative Assembly as well as the Parliament the Code of Conduct was in operation till 20th of October, 1999. On 30th June, 1999 the Government of Maharashtra passed an order making an exception in respect of the respondent No. 4 Sangh and excluding it from the general order dated 8th June, 1999 postponing the elections. Thereafter, the managing committee approached the State of Maharashtra for extension of tenure and the said application was allowed, thereby extending the tenure upto 15th of December, 1999 or till the newly elected committee took charge, whichever was earlier. On 21st October, 1999, the Collector Ahmednagar declared the election programme of the managing committee for respondent No. 4 Sangh and the date of polling was scheduled as 28th November, 1999 so that the newly elected committee could take over the reins of the respondent No. 4 earlier than 15th December, 1999. However, the said election programme came to be challenged in Writ Petition No. 5060 of 1999 which came to be rejected by this Court by order dated 25th October, 1999. Aggrieved by the said order of rejection of writ petition, S. L. P. No. 16715 of 1999 came to be filed before the Supreme Court on 30th October, 1999 and by order dated 26th November, 1999 the Supreme Court was pleased to stay the declaration of the election results. Again on 24th February, 2000 the S. L. P. was heard by the Apex Court and the stay order passed on 26th November, 1999 came to be confirmed and the S. L. P. was admitted. It is under these circumstances that the old managing committee, of which the petitioners are some of the members, continues in office.

(3.) SHRI Dhorde, the learned Counsel for the petitioners, submitted that the amendment to section 73-C (2-B) of the Act, deleting the proviso by Maharashtra Cooperative Societies (Amendment) Act, 1995 is ultravires the constitution and the benefit of the deleted proviso ought to be considered by this Court in favour of the petitioners inasmuch as the elections of the managing committee could not be held prior to 2nd August, 1999 on account of the failure on the part of the Collector and also because of the other factors, which are not, in any way, attributable to the petitioners. The challenge to the legality of section 73-H of the Act has been given up in view of the recent ordinance issued by the State of Maharashtra and the challenge to the validity of section 77-A (3) of the Act has not been pressed. The challenge to the provisions of section 73-IB, under which the Government of Maharashtra issued order dated 8th June, 1999 postponing the elections of the cooperative societies till 30th September, 1999 need not be gone into in view of the fact that the State Government, by its order dated 30th June, 1999, has already made an exception in case of the respondent No. 4 Sangh, as observed hereinabove.