BHAGWAN RAMBHAU KARANKAL Vs. STATE OF MAHARASHTRA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS is a petition by one Shri Bhagvan Rambhau Karankal, who is elected as a Municipal Councillor for Dhule Municipal Council in the month of December 1996. The petition challenges a notice purported to have been issued under section 51 (2) of the Maharashtra Municipal Councils, Nagar Panchayats and Industrial Townships Act, 1965 (hereinafter called as Municipalities Act for the purpose of brevity) by respondent No. 2 Collector, Dhule by which the members of the Dhule Municipal Council were called upon to elect President in a meeting which was scheduled to take place on 21-12-1996. The challenge is to a note in the said notice specifying that the Council will have to elect the President for a period ending on 26-2-1997 from un-reserved category.

(2.) IT is contended by the petitioner that as provided by section 52 of the Municipalities Act, the term of office of the President shall be one year. Therefore, the newly elected members of the Council have a right to elect their President for a period of one year and the Collector has no jurisdiction to curtail that term and impose a condition on the Councillors that they should elect the President only for a period which would end on 26-2-1997 meaning thereby that the President elected at the meeting would enjoy the term of about 65 days.

(3.) SHRI P. M. Shah, learned Counsel for the petitioner, contended that section 52 of the Municipalities Act gives a statutory right to any person elected to be in the office for a period of one year and if put in a different way, the Councillors have a right to elect a President for a period of one year and this term being a statutory mandate, cannot be given a go-by or curtailed by any rule framed by the State Government or a notification or a direction issued by the respondent No. 2. Shri Shah contended that the scheme of the Act goes to show that except in the case of casual vacancies the term of office of the President shall always be of one year. According to him, section 321 gives rule making power to the State Government but sub-section (2) of the said section specifically limits that power laying down that the rules shall be consistent with the Acts and generally to carry out the purposes of the Act. Even in the absence of this provision, Shri Shah submits that any rule, being a delegated legislation, will not over-ride the principal legislation and, therefore, no rule can be interpreted to mean that the statutory right given to the Councillors to elect a President for one year, can be abrogated. The second submission advanced by Shri Shah is that when the Municipal Council is dissolved and general elections take place, whatever rights the earlier Councillors had, are automatically extinguished and any liability which they may carry, cannot be brought forward and the new members cannot be burdened with it. According to him, the reservations provided for, as permissible under the constitutional mandate and the statute, are to be enforced during the existence of a Council. Every Councillor elected for a specific period of five years will have to be governed by the rules so as to give him an opportunity to enjoy the statutory rights which would begin from the date when the new Council comes into existence and which would expire on the day when the Council is dissolved.