OM PRAKASH Vs. STATE

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The petitioners are residents of Shimla and they are registered as voters in the electoral rolls of the Shimla Assembly Constituency. The first petitioner was also an elected member of the Shimla Municipal Committee (hereinafter to be referred to as "the Municipal Committee") from 1960 to 1966.

(2.) The Local-Self Government in the town of Shimla has passed through several vicissitudes. The last general election to the Municipal Committee was held sometime in 1960 under the provisions of the Punjab Municipal Act, 1911 (hereinafter to be referred to as the "Punjab Act") which was then applicable to the local area declared to be the Municipality of Shimla. By a notification dt. May 16, 1966, which was published in the Punjab Government Gazette (Extraordinary) dt. May 17, 1966, the Governor of Punjab superseded the Municipal Committee with immediate effect in exercise of the powers conferred by S.238 of the Punjab Act and directed that all powers and duties of the Municipal Committee be exercised and performed by an Administrator until the Committee was reconstituted. The validity of the said notification was challenged in Civil Writ Petitions Nos. 42 and 44 of 1967, which came to be heard and decided by a Full Bench of three Judges of the Delhi High Court (Himachal Bench). The decision of the Full Bench is reported in (1967) 3 Delhi LT 393 (Suraj Parkash v. State of Punjab). The Full Bench quashed the impugned notification but reserved to the State Government the right to proceed to supersede the Municipal Committee, if it was so advised, in accordance with law. I. D. Dua, J., speaking for the Full Bench, made the following pertinent observations in the penultimate paragraph of the judgment :

(3.) The Himachal Pradesh Municipal Act, 1968 (hereinafter to be referred to as the 'Himachal Act") was enacted by the Legislative Assembly of Himachal Pradesh and it came into force on and with effect from February 3, 1969. S.284 of the said Act, inter alia, repealed the Punjab Act as in force in the territories transferred to Himachal Pradesh under S.5 of the Punjab Re-organisation Act, 1966. Under S.285(1)(b) of the said Act, however, anything done or any action taken including, inter alia, the municipalities constituted under the repealed Act, were, so far as may be, deemed, unless the State Government otherwise directed, to have been done or taken or constituted under the corresponding provisions of the Himachal Act. The Municipality of Shimla accordingly stood duly constituted under the Himachal Act on and with effect from February 3, 1969. No election to the Municipal Committee was, however, held even while the said Act continued to apply and remained in force in the local area comprising the Shimla Municipality.