MADHUKARRAO DEORAO CHAVAN Vs. STATE OF MAHARASHTRA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) ). By this petition filed under Articles 226 and 227 of the Constitution of India, the petitioner is challenging validity of Section 112-A (1) (b) (i-a) and Section 112-A (2) (3) and (5) of Maharashtra Co-operative Societies Act, 1960. The petitioner is a member of the Maharashtra land Development Bank and is also a member of the General Body of the maharashtra Land Development Bank by virtue of being elected as delegate of District Loan Committee, Uslamanabad. To appreciate the challenge to provisions of Section 112-A of the Act, it is necessary to set out the relevant provisions of the Act.

(2.) CHAPTER XI of the Act deals with the subject of "agriculture and rural Development Bank". Section 111, inter alia, provides that the Chapter shall apply to any co-operative bank or banks advancing loans other than short term loans, to or through the Agriculture and Rural Development Bank, for the purposes of agricultural or rural development or other purposes set out in the Section. Section 112 provides for constitution of State Agricultural and Dovelopment Bank for the State of Maharashtra. Section 112-A prescribes that there shall be a District Loan Committee for each district, excluding city of Bombay and Bombay Suburban District. Section 112-A (1) (b) provides that every District Loan Committee shall consist of twelve members and out of them seven delegates will be elected and two members, one from the persons belonging to the scheduled castes or scheduled tribes and one from the persons belonging to the weaker section shall be nominated by the Registrar. The remaining three are ex-officio members, that is the district Deputy Registrar of Co-operative Societies, the Divisional Officer of the State Agriculture and Rural Development Bank and the District branch Manager of the State Agriculture and Rural Development Bank. Section 112-A (2) provides that every District Loan Committee shall have a chairman, who shall be elected by the delegates elected under sub-clause (1)and members nominated from amongst themselves. In other words the chairman is to be elected by seven delegates elected and two members nominated. The ex-officio members have neither the right to vote nor right to be elected as Chairman of District Loan Committee. Section 112-B deals with constitution of General Body and Committee of State Agriculture and Rural Development Bank. The Section, inter alia, provides that the committee of the State Agriculture and Rural Development Bank shall consist of members set out under the Section. The members are :

(3.) THE validity of the provisions conferring power upon the Registrar to nominate two members, one from the persons belonging to Scheduled castes or Scheduled Tribes and one from the persons belonging to the weaker section is under challenge. The Amending Act inter alia, provides that the expression Scheduled Castes" includes Novbudhas and the expression "schedulded Tribes" includes denotified tribes and nomedic tribes as prescribed by Explanation (b) to Section 73-B of the Act. The Amending Act further provides that the expression "member belonging to weaker Section" means a member or such class of members as the State Government may, by general or special order from time to time declare, as prescribed under Explanation (c) to Section 73-B of the Act. It is now well settled that the legislative provisions can be challenged only on two grounds (i) legislative competency : (ii)violation of any of the fundamental rights. Smt. Purohit, learned counsel appearing on behalf of the petitioner, very fairly stated that the petition does not challenge the vires of provisions of Section 112-A on the ground of legislative incompetency. The challenge to the provisions is restricted to the contention that the power conferred upon the Registrar is arbitrary and therefore violative of Article 14 of the Constitution. We are unable to accede to the submission of the learned counsel. The contention urged that the members nominated by the Registrar have a right to vote as well as right to be elected as Chairman and therefore deprives the elected member of opportunity to become Chairman is without any merit. The Legislature introduced amendment prescribing nomination of two persons, one belonging to the scheduled Castes or Scheduled Tribes and one from the weaker Section with the intention that the persons from these categories should have appropriate and sufficient representation on the District Local Committee. The concept of providing representation to the weaker Section or Scheduld Castes or scheduled Tribes is recognised by the Constitution. We are unable to appriciate how the action of the Legislature violates the fundamental rights of the petitioner merely because persons from weaker Section and Scheduled Castes or Scheduled Tribes are nominated on the District Local Committee. It is interesting in this connection to note the powers conferred on the District loan Committee under Section i 12-A (6) of the Act. The sub-Section inter alia, provides that the District Loan Committee shall have the power to sanction by itself or recommend for sanction to the State Agriculture and Rural development Bank the loans to be sanctioned It is obvious from the plain reading of Sub-Section (6) that the powers of the District Local Committee are merely recommendatory and the District Local Committee by itself cannot take any decision as regards the work of the Bank as regards sanction of the loan by the Bank. It is therefore obvious that the District Loan Committee is merely a recommendatory body and the Legislature desired that on such body there should be representation of the Scheduld Castes or Scheduled tribes as well as weaker Section. In our judgment there is no infirmity whatsoever in the amended provision,