Allahabad High Court
Sohanbir And 5 Others vs State Of U.P. And 5 Others on 4 August, 2025
HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT ALLAHABAD ?Neutral Citation No. - 2025:AHC:130728 Court No. - 32 Case :- WRIT - C No. - 25476 of 2025 Petitioner :- Sohanbir And 5 Others Respondent :- State Of U.P. And 5 Others Counsel for Petitioner :- Ritesh Upadhyay Counsel for Respondent :- Ashutosh Singh,C.S.C.,Neetu,Prabhakar Awasthi,Prashant Kumar Dubey Hon'ble Chandra Dhari Singh,J.
1. The instant writ petition has been filed seeking the following main prayers:-
"(I) Issue a writ, order or direction in the nature of certiorari calling for the record of case and to quash the impugned order dated 14.05.2025 passed by respondent no.4 i.e. District Inspector of Schools, Baghpat.
(II) Issue a writ, order or direction in the nature of mandamus commanding respondent nos. 2 and 3 to decide the representation of the petitioners within stipulated period.
(III) Issue a writ, order or direction in the nature of mandamus commanding the respondents not to give effect any order, direction and resolution passed by the alleged Committee of Management of the institution."
2. Sri G.K. Singh, learned Senior Counsel appearing on behalf of the petitioners submitted that the order impugned passed by the District Inspector of Schools, Baghpat is without application of mind and without following the procedure prescribed under the law. It is also submitted that while passing the impugned order, the D.I.O.S. concerned has not given opportunity to the petitioners and also without verifying the facts that no valid membership of the society has been obtained by the Election Officer from the office of the Deputy Registrar, Firms, Societies and Chits, Meerut.
3. Learned Senior Counsel appeared on advance notice on behalf of the State-respondents submitted that Section 4-B of the Societies Registration Act, 1860 is mandatory provision, which verified/certified the valid members of the general body to ensure the fair function of the Management as well as the Society. It is also submitted that in the present case in hand transpires that the society has not renewed last several years.
4. Learned Senior Counsel appearing on behalf of the petitioners submitted that the authorities have also failed to consider that no valid list of members of society is existing till date as the order date 20.05.2024 has not been set aside as yet. Therefore, the impugned order is bad in law, arbitrary, without application of mind and it deserves to be set aside.
5. Per contra, Sri Prabhakar Awasthi, learned counsel appearing on behalf of respondent no.6 vehemently opposed the petition on merits and submitted that there are no illegality or error in the impugned order. It is also submitted that the authorities concerned has taken all the relevant documents as well as provision on the Scheme of Administration and also follows the procedure to advertise the place of election by way of publishing in one news paper i.e. Punjab Kesari, which is also circulated in Bulandshahr as well as Baghpat and also sent that information by post. Therefore, there are no force in the argument that the petitioner has no knowledge about the alleged election.
6. Sri Prabhakar Awasthi, learned counsel appearing on behalf of respondent no.6 submitted that the law is settled that having any grievance to any of the parties against the order qua, passed by the D.I.O.S., the aggrieved person may approach the Regional Level Committee. In support of his contention, he has referred the judgment passed by Division Bench of this Court in the case of Inter College and another Vs. State of U.P. others reported in 2011(8)ADJ 493 and relied upon paragraph no.16 of the said judgment, which is quoted as below:
"Taking up the objection raised by Sri Gajendra Pratap, learned Senior Counsel that the Joint Director of Education had no jurisdiction to decide the matter relating to the election held on 16.12.2008 we are of the considered opinion that the said election was recognized by the District Inspector of Schools vide order dated 27.12.2008. At that point of time it appears that no dispute was raised before the District Inspector of Schools regarding validity of the election held on 16.12.2008. It is no doubt true that the State Government vide order dated 19th December, 2000 constituted a Regional Level Committee under the Chairmanship of Regional Joint Director of Education with the Regional Deputy Director of Education and District Inspector of Schools as members to decide the question of attesting the signatures of Manager and election dispute, but that Government Order had been superseded by the State Government vide Government Order dated 20th October, 2008 and instead of the Regional Level Committee to decide the issue of attestation of signatures of the Manager and election disputes, the District Inspector of Schools had been conferred with the power to attest the signature of Manager where there is no legal difficulty and only in case there is some legal difficulty the matter is to be referred by him to the Regional Level Committee. We are of the considered opinion that the Regional Level Committee gets the power to decide the dispute relating to election of the Committee of Manager including office bearers and recognition of Manager only when the matter is referred by the District Inspector of Schools and once the District Inspector of Schools has attested the signature of the Manager and recognized the person to be the Manager he becomes functus officio to refer the matter to the Regional Level Committee even if the dispute has been raised subsequently. In such a situation the only remedy available to the person aggrieved is to approach the higher authorities which in the present case, undoubtedly, is the Regional Joint Director of Education and, this Court, therefore, was perfectly justified while passing the order dated 30.11.2009 directing the Joint Director of Education to decide the matter after affording an opportunity of hearing to the parties concerned."
7. At this stage, Sri G.K. Singh, learned Senior Counsel appearing on behalf of the petitioners submitted that he has agreed the ratio of the above-said judgment as referred by Sri Prabhakar Awasthi, learned counsel appearing on behalf of the petitioners, during arguments and prayed that the petitioners may be given liberty to approach the respondent no.3, Regional Level Committee, Meerut Division, Meerut by way of representation and it is also prayed that the said Committee may be directed to decide the said representation in time bound manner.
8. Sri Prabhakar Awasthi, learned counsel appearing on behalf of respondent no.6 has no objection as innocuous prayer made by learned Senior Counsel appearing on behalf of the petitioners to approach the Regional Level Committee as per the judgment passed by this Court.
9. Heard Sri G.K. Singh, learned Senior Advocate assisted by Sri Ritesh Upadhyay, learned counsel appearing on behalf of the petitioner, Sri Saurabh, learned Standing Counsel appeared on advance accepted notice on behalf of the State-respondents, Sri Prabhakar Awasthi, learned counsel appearing on behalf of respondent no.6, perused the contents made in the writ petition and the documents on record.
10. Taking into consideration of the above-said submissions made by learned counsel for the respective parties, I am inclined to allow the innocuous prayer made by learned Senior Counsel appearing on behalf of the petitioners to approach the respondent no.3 by way of filing a representation along with certified copy of this order within a period of ten days from the date of production of certified copy of this order. Thereafter, respondent no.3, Regional Level Committee, Meerut Division, Meerut is directed that after giving opportunity of hearing to all the effected parties, pass a detailed and reasoned order, in accordance with law, expeditiously, preferably within a period of six weeks from the date of receiving of certified copy of this order.
11. With the aforesaid directions/observations, the present writ petition is disposed of.
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(Chandra Dhari Singh, J.) Order Date :- 4.8.2025 Atul