DHARAMBIR Vs. STATE OF HARYANA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The petitioner claiming himself to be having been duly elected Sarpanch of Gram Panchayat Munimpur Tehsil and District Jhajjar, in the last Panchayat Election, seeks issuance of a writ under Articles 226/227 of the Constitution of India, directing the respondents to administer him the oath of office of the Sarpanch, Gram Panchayat, Munimpur, forthwith and for restraining the respondents from handing over the charge of the Gram Panchayat in the meantime to any Panch of the Gram Panchayat, Munimpur. The case of the petitioner is that the contested the election of Sarpanch of the Gram Panchayat and was duly declared elected after having secured the highest number of valid votes in the Election held on March, 2000. The Returning Officer prepared a report about his election and forwarded the same to the Block Development and Panchayat Officer for onward transmission to the concerned authorities. The result of the elections were reported in the press and published in Dainik Tribune dated 15-2-2000 and the name of the petitioner having been elected as Sarpanch of the Panchayat, appeared in para 3 of the News Item, copy Annexure P-2 with the petition.

(2.) The State Government organised oath ceremony function on 26-4-2000 at Jind and the Chief Minister of Haryana administered oath to the newly elected Sarpanchres and Panches of the respective villages. However, the petitioner was not administered oath. He made epresentation but was not given due consideration. In the last election, the post of Sarpanch of Village Munimpur was reserved for Scheduled Caste (Female) and in the recent election, it was open for general category. It is the case of the petitioner that the Panches of the village Panchayat, have been administered the oath but the action of the respondents refusing to administer the oath to the petitioner, without disclosing any reason is unconstitutional and arbitrary.

(3.) The respondents have filed the writen statements denying the claim of the petitioner to the office of the Sarpanch of Village Panchayat, on the ground that the office of Sarpanch of the Village Munimpur, to which the petitioner belongs, was reserved for female general category candidate and due to the mistake of the Returning Officer, nomination papers of the petitioner were wrongly accepted and thus the election of the petitioner in the circumstances was void ab initio, which does not vest any right to the petitioner and as such the post of Sarpanch was shown vacant, in the result notified by the State.