Punjab-Haryana High Court
The Gahal Co-Operative Agriculture ... vs The State Of Punjab Through Secretary, ... on 20 August, 1991
Equivalent citations: (1992)101PLR274
JUDGMENT R.S. Mongia, J.
1. The petitioners are two Co-operative Societies i. e. The Gahal Co-operative Agricultural Service Society Ltd., Gahal and the Gagewal Co-operative Agriculture Service Society Ltd., Gagewal District Sangrur. The facts which have been pleaded in the writ petition, relate to Petitioner No. 1, only, and, therefore, I will confine only to petitioner No. 1 regarding narration of facts,
2. Wherever the word 'petitioner' occurs hereinafter, it would related to petitioner No. 1.
3. Respondent No. 2.-The Punjab State Agriculture Co-operative Marketing Federation Ltd., Chandigarh (hereinafter referred to as the 'Markfed') is a registered apex Co-operative Society, under the provisions of the Punjab Co-operative Societies Act, 1961 (hereinafter referred to as the 'Act'). It has its Head Office at Chandigarh. This apex Co-operative Society has supply Co-operative Societies arid other Co-operative Societies engaged in marketing and processing of agriculture and allied produce as its members. Bye-laws 6, 7 and 11 of the Markfed which, relate to the membership of the Markfed, are in following terms :-
"6: The membership of the Federation shall be open to supply Co-operative Societies and those Cooperative Societies engaged in marketing and processing of agricultural and killed produce and Government.
"7. Applications for membership shall be addressed to the Secretary/Managing Director of Federation. Every such application shall be disposed of by the Executive Committee- of the Federation. The applicant to whom the, admission is refused by the said Committee may appeal: to the Board of Directors within 30 days of communication of the decision of the Executive Committee. The decision of the Board on such appeal-shall of final.
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11. Every member shall on admission, pay an entrance fee of Rs. 5/-. Every member shall take at least one share whose value shall be payable in lump sum. With the prior approval , of the Registrar, the Board of Directors may, at any time, call upon the member to contribute to the share capital of the Federation by taking one or more number of shares."
4. Under the aforesaid Bye laws, the petitioner submitted an application in the office of the Markfed at its Branch Office at Sangrur for becoming a member of the Markfed. The application was accompanied by a Bank Draft dated 23rd July, 1990, representing the share money. However, it is not clear as to on what date in fact the application was submitted with the Sangrur Branch Office. However, the said application was attested by the Inspector of the Cooperative Societies on 22nd August, 1990 and by the Assistant Registrar, Co-operative Societies, Sangrur, on 12th October, 1990, in the branch office of the Markfed at Sangrur. The said application was forwarded by the Senior Accounts Officer of the branch office of the Markfed at Sangrur to the Accounts Officer of the Markfed at Chandigarh on 22/24.10.1990. The Copy of this forwarding letter is attached as Annexure P 2/3 with the written statement of the Markfed.
5. It may be observed here that at the time this application was forwarded to the Markfed office at Chandigarh, there was no Board of Directors of the Markfed in existence and instead an Administrator appointed under Section 26 (1-D) of the Act, was managing the affairs of the Markfed. It would be relevant to notice here that the maximum period of tenure of an Administrator appointed under Section 26 (1-D) of the Act is four years. The Markfed had been under an Administrator for a pretty long time and the four years' period of the Administrator came to an end on 2nd November, 1990. The application of the petitioner for becoming a member of the Markfed was not decided by the Administrator till 2nd November, 1990. Vide letter dated 19th March, 1991, written by the Senior Accounts Officer of the Markfed, petitioner was informed that since there was no Executive Committee/ Administrator in the Markfed, it could not be enrolled as a member now and whenever any Committee or Administrator is appointed, the petitioner's application would be submitted for consideration. A copy of this letter was also endorsed to the Registrar, Co-operative Societies, Punjab, Chandigarh, for information. (Copy of this letter has been attached as Annexure P-1 to the writ petition). In order to hold elections of the Directors of the Board of Markfed, various zones had been carved out. One Director had to be elected from each zone. Vide notice dated 27th May, 1991 issued in the daily Tribune, objections were invited by the Registrar, Co-operative Societies from the members regarding zones. The notice inviting objections to the framing of zones reads as under :-
" The Zonal lists of members of the Markfed for election of the Board of Directors have been approved by the Registrar, Cooperative Societies, Punjab, subject to any objection. These lists ran be seen in RCS Office, Markfed Head Office and District Managers offices in the State. The members may file their objections regarding zones in my office on any working day but nor after 10.00 A.M. on 3.6.1991. These objections will be considered by the undersigned at 11.00 A.M. on 3.6.1991 and thereafter zonal lists will be finalised."
It may be noticed here that no objections were filed by the petitioner. Thereafter, election Notice was issued by Respondent No. 2 giving details of the election programme, (Copy Annexure P. 3). The last date for the receipt of attested copies of resolutions authorising the members to represent in the election from the constituent member Societies was fixed as 3rd July, 1991. The other details of the election drogramme are also mentioned in Annexure P.3, with which we are not concerned. It has been averred in the petition that a representative of the petitioner-Society came to Chandigarh and submitted a resolution showing intention to contest elections for the Directorship of the Markfed from Zone No. 7 in which Sangrur District was placed. The petitioner was told by the Officer concern«d that the resolution could not be accepted, inasmuch as the name of the petitioner-Society did not exist in the list of members for Zone No. 7. The writ petition was filed in this Court on 5th July, 1991, praying that the election programme qua Zone No. 7 be quashed and Respondent No. 2 be directed to decide the application of the petitioner regarding the membership and elections be held to Zone No. 7 thereafter. Notice of motion was issued on 8th July, 1991, and, ultimately, the writ petition was admitted on 12th July, 1991 by the Motion Bench and it was further ordered that the declaration of the result of the election of the Director from Zone No. 7 of the Markfed be stayed.
6. Mr. M. S. Khaira, learned Senior Advocate, appearing on behalf of the petitioner, submitted before me that till the petitioner's application regarding membership was decided, no election to Zone No. 7 could be held as the electoral roll was not complete. He further submitted that under Rule 17 of the Co-operative Societies Rules, 1963 (hereinafter referred to as the Rules) if no decision was taken on the application within one month after the submission of the application for becoming a member, then such an applicant would be deemed to be a member of the Society, and, therefore, once it is held that the petitioner was a deemed member of the Markfed, the representative of the petitioner could not be refused to contest the election. It will be appropriate here to notice Rule 17 of the Rules, which is in the following terms:-
" 17. Disposal of application for admission of member.- Section 35 (2) (v)--A co-operative society, other than a producer society, shall dispose of on application received for admission as a member as early as possible and in no case latter than the expiration of a period of one month from the date of receipt of the application by the society. In case of refusal to admit, such society shall communicate its decision together with reasons therefore, to the applicant."
On the strength of the rule, quoted above, the learned counsel for the petitioner, argued that the application for admission as a member of a Co-operative Society had to be decided as early as possible and the outside limit given for taking a decision was one month. According to him the rules envisages the communication of a decision to the applicant only in case the membership was being refused. From this, argued the learned counsel, it followed that in case no decision was communicated within one month or immediately thereafter, it would be deemed that the applicant had been admitted as a member and his application would be deemed to have been accepted.
7. On the other hand, learned counsel for the respondents, argued that there was no Executive Committee/Board of Director/Administrator after 2nd November, 1990, who could have taken a decision on the application of the petitioner, which was despatched by Sangrur office on 24th October, 1990. According to respondents, the application must have, been received by the Chandigarh office any time on 25th October, 1990 or thereafter and, since only after a week on 2nd November, 1990, the Administrator's term had come to an end, no-decision was possible to be taken by any Authority within one month of the receipt of the application, Under these circumstances, according to the learned counsel for the respondents, the petitioner could not be deemed to be a member of the Markfed, According to them, even the petitioner was informed oh 19th March, 1991 that since there was no Executive Committee/Administrator, no decision had been taken on his application and the application could be decided only after the Executive Committee or Administrator is appointed. To this argument of the learned counsellor the respondents the petitioner's counsel replied that; the Act and the Rules do not envisage a situation when in a Co-operative Society there will be no Managing Committee/Board of Directors or an Administrator. It is the bounded duty of the Managing Committee/Board of Directors or of the Administrator, as the case may be, to arrange for the elections of the New Managing Committee/Board of Directors before the end of their tenure. According to learned counsel Mr. M. S. Khaira, there cannot be any vaccum in the working of the Act and in, case the Board of Directors or the Administrator was not there, the Registrar Co-operative Societies, which is the Appellate Authority under Section 68 (1) (c) of the Act, against the order refusing to admit, a member, could have decided the application of the petitioner in the absence of the Administrator. He further referred to Annexure R-2/1, which is a letter dated 6th November, 1990 from the Registrar, Cooperative Societies to the Managing Director of the Markfed, giving instructions to him regarding the day today management in the absence of Administrator/Board of Directors. From this, learned counsel emphasised that the Registrar, Co-operative Societies, could have decided the application of petitioner. In any case, he submitted that the General Body of a Society, being supreme body, the application could have been decided by the General body and the Registrar or the Managing Director could have called a meeting of the general body.
8. After hearing the learned counsel for the parties on this point, I am of the view that there is substance in the submissions of the learned counsel for the petitioner. Rule 17 of the Rules, quoted above, clearly envisages that the application regarding membership has to be ,decided as early as possible. This means such an application has to receive very urgent attention and should be disposed of as early as possible No doubt, the outside limit given is one month, but that does not mean that the decision making authority on the point must take one month, i.e. the outside limit, but the law requires that the application be disposed of at the earliest possible. The learned counsel rightly submitted that under these circumstances, it was for the respondents to explain as to why the application could not be decided up to 2nd . November, 1990, when admittedly the Administrator, was. there Further, the language used in the rule is in mandatory form that application has to be decided as early as possible and not later than one month of the receipt of the application. This one month period is a mandatory period within, which the application has to be decided. Since the rule envisages that in case of refusal to admit a member, a decision will have to be conveyed, it would be reasonable to infer that in case no decision is conveyed to the applicant within one month or immediately thereafter, the application would be deemed to have been accepted and the applicant inducted as member. Since the Act is silent as to what is to happen, if neither there is a Board of Directors nor an Administrator, it would be again reasonable to hold that the Appellate Authority (which is Registrar in the present case) should decide the application. Since in the present case, no decision was conveyed to the petitioner within one month or immediately thereafter, the petitioner would be deemed to be a member of the Markfed.
9. Now the question that arises is whether by deeming the petitioner to be a member of the Markfed, is he entitled to the relief that the election to Zone No. 7 should be ordered to be reheld. I am of the opinion that the petitioner is not entitled to that relief. The petitioner was informed by the Markfed on 19th March, 1991 that his application for becoming a member had not been decided, as there was no Executive Committee/Administrator and the same would be decided, by the new Executive Committee or the Administrator. This would have put the petitioner on some guard that he was not being treated a member of the Markfed. Further, on 27th May, 1991, when the objections regarding the zones were invited, the petitioner did not raise an objection that its name had not been shown in Zone No. 7. The petitioner's counsel submitted that he could ignore the letter of the Markfed dated 19th March, 1991 as that was much after one month of the submission of the application for becoming a member and he would reasonably consider himself to have become a member as no decision had been conveyed regarding rejection, if .any, within one month or immediately thereafter. Further, he submitted that the objections which were invited vide notice dated 27th May, 1991 were only regarding the geographical limits of the zones and hot whether a particular member's name had been included therein or not, Since, the petitioner bad no - objection to the geographical limits, he did not raise any objection as he could reasonably presume that his name was in the zonal list.
10. In Lakshmi Charan Sen and Ors. v. A. K. N. Hassan Uzzaman, A. I. R. 1985 S. C. 1233. Which was a case under the Representation of the People Act, it was. held that where claims for inclusion of names and objections relating to inclusion of certain names in the electoral rolls, had not been disposed of, the election would not be vitiated thereby and the election had to be held on the basis of electoral rolls in force on the last date for making nominations. Applying the same principle, at best it could be a case of a wrong electoral roll where the petitioner's name had not been included, but for this purpose objections were invited on 27th May, 1991 and the petitioner failed to raise objections regarding the non-inclusion of his name in Zone No. 7. The respondent markfed had no option but to go ahead with the election as per the electoral rolls which were there on the date of nomination. I do not agree with the learned counsel for the petitioner that the objections which were invited were only regarding the geographical limits of the zones The notice clearly envisaged objections regarding inclusion or non-inclusion of the names of the members. The petitioner, it seems, did not consider himself to be a member of the Markfed as even the prayer in the writ petition is that the respondent-Markfed should be directed to decide his application. It was only during the course of arguments that the petitioner's counsel developed this point that the petitioner would be deemed to be a member. In view of this as also the communication to the petitioner dated 19th March, 1991 that his application had not been decided he should have raised objections to the electoral rolls of Zone No. 7. It is not necessary for me to notice any other authority cited by the learned counsel for the petitioner, in view of the law laid down by the Supreme Court in Lakshmi Charan Sen's case (supra).
11. To be fair to the learned counsel for respondent No. 3, I may also notice an argument raised on the basis of Rule 25(f) of the Rules, which is in the following terms :-
"25 (f), he has, during a period of 12 months preceding the date of filing of nomination papers, remained inactive as member or has-been carrying on through agencies other than the Cooperative Society of which he is a member, the same business as is being carried on by the Cooperative Society."
The argument proceeded that even if the petitioner had been inducted as a member, he could not have fought elections, inasmuch as 12 months preceding the date of filing nomination papers he had remained inactive. In other words, the submissions was that unless a person has been a member of a society at least for a period of 12 months, he cannot contest elections of the society. For the view I am taking in the matter it is not necessary for me to opine on this matter.
12. For the foregoing reasons, it is held that the petitioner would be deemed to be a member of the Markfed, but there is nothing wrong in the elections to Zone No. 7 which have already taken place and the same cannot be set aside simply because the petitioner's name was not there in the electoral rolls, inasmuch as he has failed to raise any objection to the electoral rolls, when the same were invited. The result of the election of Zone No. 7, which was stayed by this Court, be declared forthwith.
13. Subject to what has been held above, this writ petition fails and is dismissed, but there will be no order as to costs.