SADASHIVRAO MANDALIK KAGAL TALUKA SAHAKARI SAKHAR KARKHANA LTD Vs. REGIONAL JT DIRECTOR SUGAR KOLHAPUR REGION KOLHAPUR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) These petitions have been placed before us to decide reference made by learned Judge of this Court (Coram : G.S.Godbole, J.) in respect of the provision relating to hearing of appeals by the by the Secretary in the Co-operation Department of State of Maharashtra under section 152 of the Maharashtra Co-operative Societies Act, 1960 (the MCS Act).

(2.) The petitions filed before the learned Judge arose from orders passed by the Regional Joint Director (Sugar) and Joint Registrar, Cooperative Societies in proceedings under Section 11 read with Section 25A of the MCS Act. All the petitioners had filed statutory appeals under section 152 of the MCS Act before the State Government. The Secretary issued notices to the petitioners to appear before him in respect of hearing of the appeals. This action of the Secretary was questioned in the petitions. During the hearing of the petitions before the learned Judge (Coram : G.S.Godbole, J.), reliance was placed on judgment of another learned Judge (Coram : R.M.S. Khandeparkar, J.) in the case of Shri Ravindra V. Gaikwad v. The State of Maharashtra and others, 2002 2 AllMR 489to contend that the Secretary will have no power to hear the appeals under section 152 of the Cooperative Societies Act. Reliance was placed, in particular, on the following observations:-

(3.) The learned Judge (Coram : G.S.Godbole, J.) having found himself not in agreement with the view expressed by the Single Judge ((R.M.S.Khandeparkar, J.) referred the matters for constitution of the larger Bench by order dated 29 February 2012 for answering the following questions:-