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"Section 21-c. Restriction on consecutive membership in committee: A person who held office as a member of the committee for two consecutive terms shall not be eligible for being chosen as a member of the committee for a third term in continuation.

Explanation : For purpose of this section :

(i) Where a period, during which there is no elected committee, intervenes between two terms of office of the committee or of any of its members, those two terms shall be regarded as being consecutive to each other :

16. Points 2 and 3:-- It is provided under Section 21-C that a person who holds or has held office as a member of the committee for two consecutive terms shall not be eligible for being chosen as a member of the Committee for a third term in continuation. The expression "committee" will take in both an elected committee and a nominated committee. If the legislature intended by the expression "committee" used there as meaning only an elected committee, they would have said so clearly. When they intended it to be an elected committee, when they said that in between two terms of office of the committee if a period intervenes during which there was no elected committee those two terms should be regarded as being consecutive terms mentioned in the main section. Even in the Explanation when reference is made to the two terms of office there also they said only 'committee' and not 'elected committee' as mentioned in the earlier portion of then for the committee during the intervening period. Therefore, a plain reading of the main section and the explanation together makes it abundantly clear as to what the Legislature meant when they used only the expression 'committee' both in the main section and in the Explanation without using the expression 'elected committee'. They must have meant it to be both an elected committee and a nominated committee. The reason also is obvious when we got the objects and reasons for enacting this provision to disqualify a person to hold office as a member of the committee continuously for three (terms). In the Amendment Act by which S. 21-C was introduced, it was mentioned that at the conference of Chief Ministers and Ministers of the States in charge of co-operation held at Madras on 12th June, 1968, certain recommendations were made for amending the Co-operative Societies Act in force in the States so as to make a provision among other matters for curbing the growth of vested interests in co-operative societies ad to impose a restriction on holding membership in the committee of co-operative societies consecutively for more than two terms. Therefore, the intention of the Legislature in enacting the restriction in Section 21-C of the New Act is to prevent the growth of vested interests in co-operative societies by imposing a break in continuity in office for more than two terms. If that was the object in enacting Section 21-C of the New Act, it is clear that the Legislature would not have intended the holding of office as a member of the committee only with regard to an elected committee and not a nominated committee and that too for the two consecutive terms to take place only subsequent to the introduction of Section 21-C without any reference to the holding of office as a member of the committee prior to the enactment of that section. For the restriction to operate that the Legislature intended both the subsequent and the previous holding of office as a member of the committee is clear from the language used in the Section when it said "a person who holds or has held office". This expression used in the section clearly indicates that though the restriction is only for being chosen as a member of the committee for a third term after coming into force of Section 21-C the holding of office as a member of the Committee both at the time the section came into force and also the office held earlier have to be taken into account for the purpose of the two consecutive terms mentioned therein.

25. In the decision Bidhu Bhusan v. State of West Bengal AIR 1962 Cal 901 the Calcutta High Court has held that Art. 19 (1) (c) which speaks of the right of a citizen to form Associations or Unions refers to the ordinary right which is enjoyed by all citizens. It has no reference to a right which is conferred by a particular statute to act as members of a body which is the creation of the statute itself.

26. Apart from the Committee being a committee of the co-operative society registered under the Act, we do not think the restriction in question imposed on becoming a member of the Committee for more than two consecutive terms violates the fundamental right to form Association guaranteed under Article 19 (1) (c) of the Constitution. It is not the case of the petitioners that they are restricted from forming a co-operative society under the Act, or there was any compulsion on them to form a society under the Act or to become members of a society registered under the Act. Simply for the reason that some restrictions are imposed in connection with the working of the Society, that does not amount to curtailing the freedom of forming a society unless the restriction goes to the very root of the matter, which amounts to taking away the freedom to form an Association. In the present case the restriction is only to become a member of the Committee for a consecutive third term. That means one cannot become a member of the Committee for more than two terms continuously. There is no restriction on becoming member of the Committee once again there after for two ore terms. With an interval of one term in between one can become a member of the Committee consecutively for two terms any number of times. This restriction the Legislature in their wisdom thought to be necessary in order to prevent vested rights being established in the Societies which is not very healthy for proper working of the Societies. Therefore, this is not a matter which touches the very right to form a society. We are unable to agree with the argument of Sri P.A. Chowdary that if such restriction is imposed that would be abridging or taking away the right to form a society or an Association. In this connection Sri Chowdary placed strong reliance on two decisions of the Supreme Court. Smt. Damyanti Naranga v. Union of India and O.K.Ghosh v. E.X. Joseph . In the first decision referred to above, the validity of the Hindi Sahiya Samelan Act (1962) was in question. Under Section 4 (4) of the Act apart from persons who are members of the Society, some more members have been added without any option being available to the existing members of the Society to elect or refuse to elect them as members which was the right they possessed under construction of the Society itself. The Supreme Court said that the Act does not merely regulate the administration of the affairs of the society; what it does is to alter the composition of the Society itself. The result of this change in the composition is that the members, who voluntarily formed the Association, are now compelled to act in that Association with other members who have been imposed as members by the Act and in whose admission to membership they had no say. Such alternation in the composition of the Association itself clearly interferes with the right to continue to function as members of the Association which was voluntarily formed by the original founders. The right to form an Association implies that the persons forming the Association have also the right to continue to be associated with only those whom they voluntarily admit in the Association. Any law, by which members are introduced in the voluntary Association without any option being given to the members to keep them out, or any law which takes away the membership of those who have voluntarily joined it, will be a law violating the right to form an Association. Therefore, the Supreme Court said on the fact of that case, that the provision of law by which committee members have been added to the Society without any opinion being available to the existing members of the Society to elect or refuse to elect them as members is violative of Art. 19 (1) (c) of the Constitution. Thus, the facts of that case are clearly distinguishable from the facts before us. In the present case, the only restriction imposed under Section 21-C of the Act is to be a member of the Committee continuously for a third term. This is not a provision which restricts the right to continue the Association with its composition as voluntarily agreed upon by the persons forming the Association. In this case, the Supreme Court referred to their earlier case, which is the second case mentioned above.

34. Therefore, so long as there is no impediment to form an Association or to become a member or having become a member to continue or not as a member of Association, no provision of law can be said to infringe the fundamental rights guaranteed under Article 19 (1) (c) of the Constitution merely because such a provision seeks to regulate the functioning and administration of the Association in the day to day working and in the process imposes some restrictions, more so when they are conceived in the best interests of the Association. It is only in cases where a provision of law actually amounts to curtailing the right to form an association in the sense mentioned above, that can be said to be violative of the fundamental rights guaranteed under Article 19 (1) (c) of the Constitution. As we have already discussed above, the restriction imposed under Section 21-C on any person from becoming a member of the Committee of the Society for more than two consecutive terms cannot be said to amount to curtailing the right or freedom of a person to form an Association. As mentioned above, the Legislature in their wisdom thought that such a restriction is necessary in order to prevent any person from acquiring any vested interest in the Society, which is not a healthy sign for proper and efficient working of the society in the best interests of all its members. Therefore, Section 21-C of the Act is not violative of the fundamental right guaranteed under Article 19 (1) (c) of the Constitution not only for the reason that the right to form a Co-operative Society under a Co-operative Societies Act is not a fundamental right and it is only a right given under the Act subject to its provisions and the Rules framed thereunder, but also on the ground that the restriction like the one imposed under Section 21-C prohibiting a person from becoming a member of a Managing Committee of a Society consecutively for more than two terms cannot be said to be the one which either in reality or in substance amounts to restricting the right to form an Association guaranteed under it.