SHYAM SINGH Vs. REGISTRAR CO OP SOC HARYANA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) It appears to be a case which ought to have been sorted out by the authorities, failure whereof, has caused the petitioner a loss which can not be compensated. The way and manner in which Syam Singh was kept out of office for all this while has given an undeniable impression to the Court that the petitioner has been meted out with complete injustice. The facts in the wake whereof, the petitioner, in the present writ filed by him under Article 226 of the Constitution of India, seeks quashing of order deted May 26, 1393, Annexure P-4, need a brief mention before any directions are issued in this case.

(2.) Petitioner was admitted a Member of the Society known as Primary Cooporative Land Mortgage Rural and Development Bank, Ballabgarh, in terms of Section 16 of the Haryana Cooperative Societies Act, 1984, 3hri Kanwarpal Singh-respondent No. 4, was also a member of the said Society. The Society has governing committee consisting of given members. Whereas, six members of the Committee are elected from amongst its voters, two are nominated by way of co-option and remaining there are Government officials to be nominated by the Registrar, Cooperative Societies, Haryana. The election of the elected members of the Committee is held in accordance with the Punjab Cooperative Societies. Rules and as per Rule 1 (g), of person, who is either a share-holder or an authorised representative a members of the society is voter and is qualified to participate in the election Election of six members of the Committee was required to be held and consequently Assistant Registrar, Cooperative Societies, vide notiflcation dared August 30, 1985 was delegated the powers of the Registrar, Cooperative Societies Haryana. As per the election program, the last date for receipt of nomination was July 3, 1992. scrutiny of nominations was to be done on July 4 1992 Withdrawals were permissible uptp July 3, 1992 and the poll was to be held on July 15, 1992. The election process was duly gone into and the polling took place as scheduled on July 15, 1992. However, while the votes polled at the election had been counted, respondent No. 4 took up 35 valid votes, which concededly had been cast in favour of the petitioner and threw them ont. The said Votes, but for three, were lost and even by the police help the same could not be located. That being the situation, the Presiding Officer, addressed communication dated July 15 1992, AnnexureP-1, to the Assistant Registrar, Cooperative Societies exercising the powers of the Registrar. He clearly informed the Assistant Registrar that at the time of counting when votes polled in favour of both the candidates had been separated and the counting of bundles of Snri Sham Singh was going on, 35 votes were kept on the table after counting which were in favour of Shri Sham Singh i.e. the petitioner, other candidate Shri Kanwarpal Singh-respondent No. 4 herein, who was sitting in the counting snatched away those 35 votes and threw the same from outlet of the room. The police deputed there immediately caught Kanwarpal Singh but only three votes could be recovered with the help of police from the crowd out of the total votes which were thrown. Out of the remaining votes there were 124 votes in favour of Shyam Singh-petitioner whereas 138 votes were in favour of Kanwarpal Singh-respondent No. 4. The Presiding Officer clearly mentioned in his report that the votes which were thrown out were cast in favour of the petitioner, out of which only three could be found out The Presiding Officer sent the matter to the Assistant Registrar for soliciting his opinion. It is surprising to note that the Assistant Registrar after referring to the facts, as detailed in the report, passed an order, Annexure P-3, that on account of non-availability the valid ballot papers, result of the election could not be declared,

(3.) In response to the notice issued by this Court at the motion stage whereas reply was filed by the official respondents, no reply was filed on behalf of respondent No. 4, who is now being represented by counsel In the written statement that has been filed by the officials respondents the matter has been sought to be contested on the sole ground that in a situation like this, Rule 27(1) of the Election Rules would apply and the same in terms mandates re-election Inasmuch as the only opposition to the praver made by the petitioner is based upon Rule 27, the same needs to be repro-duced. It runs as under :