DHARAM PAL Vs. STATE OF HARYANA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Dharam Pal petitioner is practising as an Advocate at Kaithal, District Kurukshetra. He is an elected Sarpanch of village Chhot. He is also a member of the Block Samiti, Kaithal. He is a Director of the Kaithal Co-operative Marketing-cum-Processing Society Limited, Kaithal. He was also elected to the office of Director, Kurukshetra Central Co-operative Bank Limited, Kurukshetra. In this capacity he sought election to the office of Director, Haryana State Co-operative Bank Limited, Chandigarh (hereinafter referred to as the Bank) and was duly elected to the said office. He claims that, since his election as director of the Bank, he has been taking keen interest in the development of the co-operative movement.

(2.) On 11-7-1985 he was staying in the Guest House of the Bank, located in House No. 713, Sector 8, Chandigarh, Shri Jaibir Singh Verma, member of the Haryana Subordinate Services Selection Board, was also staying there. He states that the Directors of the Bank had been feeling inconvenience during their stay in the Guest House of the Bank at Chandigarh as it mostly remained occupied by persons not entitled to occupy the same. He Objected to the stay of Mr. Jaibir Singh Verma who took it ill and there was some unpleasantness between them at night on 11-7-1985. Shri Verma is stated to have reported the matter to the Managing Director of the Bank who, in turn, recommended to the Registrar, Co-operative Societies, respondent No. 2, that action should be taken against the petitioner under Section 35 of the Haryana Co-operative Societies Act, 1984 (hereinafter referred to as the 'Act'). Respondent No. 2, vide an order dated 7-8-1985, in the purported exercise of power under sub-section (2) of Section 35 of the Act, suspended the petitioner from the membership of the Committee of the Bank and also served him with a notice to show cause as to why he should not be removed from the membership of the Committee of the Bank under Section 35 (1) of the Act. He submitted his reply to the show cause notice but no action on the same was taken for quite some time. He, therefore, filed Civil Writ Petition No. 4398 of 1985 in this Court, challenging the order of his suspension and the show cause notice served on him for bis removal from the membership of the Committee of the Bank. The aforesaid writ petition came up for motion hearing before the Division Bench after notice to the respondents. After hearing the counsel for the parties, a direction was issued to respondent No. 2 to complete the enquiry in pursuance of the show cause notice and pass an appropriate order by 5-12-1985. After receiving evidence and hearing arguments of the parties, respondent No. 2, passed the impugned order dated 4-12-1985 (Annexure P-1) directing removal of the petitioner from the membership of the Managing Committee of the Bank. The petitioner challenged the aforesaid order by filing Civil Writ Petition No. 5825 of 1985. It came up for motion hearing on 25-2-1986. After hearing the learned counsel for the parties, the Division Bench passed the following orders:

(3.) The petition has been opposed by the respondents and a written statement on their behalf has been filed by the Additional Registrar (Credit), Co-operative Societies of Haryana. It has been asserted that the impugned orders have been passed in pursuance of the power vested by the Act and that the petitioner was afforded reasonable opportunity to explain his position, The impugned orders were passed after due enquiry and consideration of the reply filed by the petitioner.