BAIKUNTH NATH UPADHYAYA Vs. STATE OF BIHAR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The petitioner is the Pramukh of Namkun (Khijri) Pan-chayat Samiti is the district of Ranchi. He has filed this writ application for quashing Notification No. 8220 L. S. G., dated the 27th of November, 1970, purported to have been issued by the Government of Bihar under Clause (c) of Section 6 of the Bihar and Orissa Municipal Act, 1922. A copy of the said notification has been made Annesure '1' to the writ application. By the impugned notification a number of villages either in whole or in part have been included within the Doranda Notified Area.

(2.) As stated in the writ application, Namkum Panchayat Samiti consists of twenty Gram Panchayats which were constituted by various notifications of the Bihar Government in or about the year 1950. All the twenty Gram Panchayats were brought under the jurisdiction of the Namkum Block Samiti in the year 1964 when the Bihar Panchayat Samitis and Zila Pari-shads Act, 1961 hereinafter to be called "Bihar Act 6 of 1962", came into force in the district of Banchi. It is said that on the 16th of January, 1964, the first Panchayat Samiti of Namkum Block was elected and after the expiry of its term the election of office bearers of the said Samiti was held in June 1967 in which the petitioner was elected the Pramukh. As provided under Section 5 of Bihar Act 6 of 1962, the Panchayat Samiti consists of the Mukhiyas of all the twenty Gram Panchayats, the representatives of Co-operative Societies and other institutions and certain individuals. The petitioner, in the capacity of the Pramukh of Namkum Panchayat Samiti, has challenged the validity of the notification mainly on the ground that the Panchayat Samiti was not consulted before the villages in whole or in part were excluded from the Block and were included in the Notified Area. The validity of the notification has further been challenged on the ground that there has been contravention of the provisions of Section 3 (3) of the Bihar Panchayat Raj Act, 1947, hereinafter to be called "Bihar Act 7 of 1948", because the State Government altered the local limits of the jurisdiction of the various Gram Panchayats by excluding villages or parts of the villages without ascertaining the views of the people of the area affected by such alteration. In course of his argument, Mr. Thakur Prasad, learned counsel appearing for the petitioner, raised another contention relating to the validity of the notification. He submitted that the State Government has no power to include any area to the Notified Area already constituted under Section 388 of the Bihar and Orissa Municipal Act, 1922.

(3.) I will first deal with the main ground on which the validity of the notification has been challenged. Chapter II of Bihar Act 6 of 1962 provides for constitution, incorporation, composition etc. of the Fanchayat Samitis. Under Section 3 (1) of that Act the State Government has been empowered (a) to declare any area within a particular district to be a Block and name the Block, (b) to include any area within the same district in a Block so declared, (c) to exclude any area from any such Block, or (d) to transfer any area from one Block to another within the same district. By Bihar Act 4 of 1964 a proviso has been added to Section 3 (1) which reads as under: