IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB AND HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH Civil Writ Petition No. 3344 of 2010 Date of decision: 6th October, 2010 Sikander Singh … Petitioner Versus Registrar, Cooperative Societies, Punjab and others … Respondents CORAM: HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE KANWALJIT SINGH AHLUWALIA Present: Mr. M.S. Kang, Advocate for the petitioner. Ms. Sudeepti Sharma, DAG Punjab, for respondents No.1, 6 and 7. Mr. Ashwani Prashar, Advocate for respondents No.2 to 4. Mr. Harit Sharma, Advocate with Mr. Naginder Singh Vashist, Advocate for respondent No.5. KANWALJIT SINGH AHLUWALIA, J. (ORAL) Present writ petition has been filed with a prayer that a writ in the nature of certiorari be issued and the impugned order (Annexure P-2) dated 17th November, 2009 passed by respondent No.1-Registrar, Cooperative Societies, Punjab, Chandigarh be set aside. It has further been prayed that respondents No.2 to 4 be restrained from performing duties as elected Directors of the respondent-Bank with immediate effect. The present case calls for interpretation of Section 26B of the Punjab Cooperative Societies Act, 1961 (hereinafter referred to as, ‘the Act’), which reads as under: “26B. (1) No individual shall, at any time, be a member of committee of (a) more than two primary societies; and Civil Writ Petition No.3344 of 2010 (b) more than one central and one apex society. Provided that nothing in this sub-Section shall apply to a member nominated under sub-Section (2) of Section 26 or to a member of the committee of an apex or central society nominated to serve on the committee of another apex or central society, as the case may be, in accordance with the provisions of their bye-laws. (2) No person shall be eligible for being elected to the committee of any co-operative society after he has served on committee of that co-operative society for two continuous terms, unless a period of not less than one term has expired since he last so served.” Before this Court ventures to interpret Section 26B, it will be necessary to notice the brief facts of the case. Respondents No.2 to 4 were elected as Directors of The Hoshiarpur Central Cooperative Bank Ltd., Hoshiarpur (hereinafter referred to as, ‘the Bank’) in the month of June 1991 for a term of three years, which they completed in the month of June 1994. They were re- elected as Directors of the Bank in the month of June 1994 and remained as such from 26th June, 1994 to 26th June, 1999. It will be pertinent to notice here that the term of a managing committee is defined under Section 26(1B) of the Act. Before the year 1993, the term was for a period of three years and later-on an amendment was introduced and the term was prescribed as five years. Therefore, before the year 1993, the term of each managing committee was three years and thereafter, it was five years. This explains as to why the present respondents No.2 to 4 remained as Directors of the Bank from the month of June 1991 to 1994 in the first term and from 26th June, 1994 to 26th June, 1999 in the second term. It is an admitted case of the parties that from 27th June, 1999 till the month of November 2006, no election was held and the affairs of the 2 Civil Writ Petition No.3344 of 2010 Bank were managed by the Administrator/Supervisory Officer. Subsequently, an election was held in the month of November 2006 and respondents No.2 to 4 were again elected as the Directors of the Bank. Mr. M.S. Kang, Advocate appearing for the petitioner, has made following submissions: (a) That the very purpose and object, for which Section 26B(2) of the Act has been introduced, is to ward-off the strong hold of the few persons over the cooperative movement and therefore, the legislation has envisaged that after being in office for two terms, the Directors should not occupy and hold the same office for one term. (b) Relying upon Section 26B(2) of the Act, Mr.Kang has stated that by re-election of respondents No.2 to 4, it amounted to their third consecutive term, for which they were disqualified to hold office in view of Section 26B(2) of the Act. I have read carefully Section 26B(2) of the Act. It specifically states “unless the period of not less than one term has expired since he last so served”. This Court has to ponder as to what these words mean. They necessarily mean that for a period of one term, which is five years, the Directors earlier elected have to remain out of office. It is not disputed that in the present case, respondents No.2 to 4, who have been re- elected as Directors, remained out of office for a period of seven years. Under Section 26B(2) of the Act, it has not been specifically stated that they will not be entitled to another term. The period of one term is to be construed as per Section 26(1B) of the Act, i.e. five years. Mr.Kang has referred to Section 26(1B) of the Act to say that the period of five years shall be reckoned from the date of election. That being so, the term of the petitioner came to an end in the year 1999. 3 Civil Writ Petition No.3344 of 2010 Section 26B(2) of the Act is to be read independently as it conveys a definite meaning, therefore, there is no need to read the same in conjunction with Section 26(1B) of the Act. Mr. Kang has further referred to a judgment rendered by a Division Bench of this Court in Civil Writ Petition No.18234 of 2007 titled as ‘Harmohinder Singh v. Financial Commissioner, Cooperation, Punjab, Chandigarh and others’ decided on 18th August, 2008 and has relied upon the following passing observations made therein: “Sub-Section 2 of Section 26-B envisages that no person shall be eligible for being elected to the Committee of Cooperative Society for the third consecutive term.” The Division Bench, while considering the third consecutive term, has not considered the words given in Section 26B(2) of the Act, which specifically states that unless a period of not less than one term has expired since he last so served. Furthermore, the Division Bench was not seized of the issue that if for a period of seven years Directors have remained out of office, which is a period of more than one term, what answer is to flow. Sub-Section 2 of Section 26-B purposely has not used the word ‘consecutive’ on which Mr.Kang has laid emphasis while referring to the above said observation. This court cannot become oblivious of the fact that legislature in its wisdom has used words ‘a period of not less than one term has expired’ and not the third consecutive term. That being so, respondents No.2 to 4 have remained out of office for a period of more than five years. The revisional authority considered this and observed as under: “After considering the arguments and record I agree with the argument advanced by the counsel for the respondent that from June 1999 to Nov. 2006 there was Administrator and Supervisory Officer in the Bank and have 4 Civil Writ Petition No.3344 of 2010 been exercising the power of the committee as Administrator and carrying on the business of the Bank. In this manner there is a gap of one full term of the committee between previous committee and the present committee. One of the petitioner has withdrawn his petition in writing.” This Court does not find any infirmity in the reasoning propounded by the revisional authority. Mr.Ashwani Prashar, Advocate appearing for respondents No.2 to 4, has raised objections and has submitted that the petitioner has no locus-standi to file a writ petition. Learned counsel has stated that the revision petition was even filed after a delay of more than three years of the election of respondents No.2 to 4. Mr.Prashar has relied upon various other judgments to say that once a candidate is elected inspite of his disqualification, the only remedy is to file an election petition for setting aside the election. Once the nomination papers were accepted and the election was held, any disqualification stood cured and can only be made subject matter of an election petition. To controvert the objections raised by Mr.Prashar, Mr.Kang has submitted that there is a mark difference between setting aside the election and removal of a person from the office. If that is so, the petitioner ought to have filed a writ petition for quo-warranto instead of approaching the revisional authority. Taking totality of circumstances into consideration, this Court is of the opinion that no interference is warranted in the present writ petition and the same is hereby dismissed, with no order as to costs. [KANWALJIT SINGH AHLUWALIA] JUDGE October 6, 2010 rps 5