1 IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT BOMBAY NAGPUR BENCH, NAGPUR. CRI.REVISION APPLICATION NO.43 OF 2008 (ASHOK SHYAMSUNDAR ZUNZUNWALA VS. PRAMOD R.AGRAWAL & 11 OTH.) AND CRI.REVISION APPLICATION NO.44 OF 2008 (ASHOK SHYAMSUNDAR ZUNZUNWALA VS. BHIKALAL HIRALAL AGRAWAL & 17 OTH) _____________________________________________________________________________________________ Office Notes, Office Memoranda of Coram, appearances, Court's orders or directions and Registrar's orders. Court's or Judge's orders ______________________________________________________________________________________________ Shri Anand Deshpande, Advocate for applicant. Shri S.A.Mohta, Advocate for Respondents. CORAM : R.C.CHAVAN, J. DATED : JANUARY 6, 2009. 1. By these two revision applications, the applicant/ original complainant before the learned Judicial Magistrate First Class, Khamgaon, takes exception to revisional judgment of the learned Additional Sessions Judge, Khamgaon, who set aside the learned Magistrate's order directing issuance of process. The learned Additional Sessions Jude, by his judgment, dismissed the complaints for want of sanction under Section 148 of the Maharashtra Co-operative Societies Act, 1960 (hereinafter referred to as “the Cooperative Societies Act”). 2 2. The complainant is a member of Shri Agrasen Sahakari Pat Sanstha, Shegaon, Branch Khamgaon. Accused No.1 was the Manager, accused No.2 was the President and accused Nos. 3 to 12 were the Directors of the said society. The applicant sought certain information from the society by an application dated 15.09.2005 and then even issued a registered notice on 01.10.2005. However, he was not provided with necessary information. The applicant, therefore, believed that if a member seeks information after depositing necessary fees from a cooperative society it is “moral responsibility” of the society to provide such information and if the society avoids, “it is one type of offence”. He, therefore, approached the learned Magistrate by filing a complaint alleging that the Non- applicants had committed an offence punishable under Section 146 of the Maharashtra Co-operative Societies Act, on account of their failure to comply with the provisions of Section 32 of the Co-operative Societies Act. The learned Magistrate directed issuance of process, which orders were challenged by the accused before the learned Sessions Judge, who delivered the impugned judgments. 3 3. I have heard learned counsel for both, the complainant as well as the accused. 4. Section 32(2) of the Co-operative Societies Act undoubtedly obliges the society to provide to a member, on his request in writing, on payment of fees, copies of documents mentioned in sub-section (1) of Section 32, namely, a copy of the Act, the Rules and the bye-laws, the audited annual balance sheet, the profit and loss account, a list of the members of the committee and a register of members, the minutes of general meeting, minutes of committee meetings and those portions of books and records in which transactions with the society have been recorded. 5. Section 146 of the Co-operative Societies Act, on which the complainant placed reliance, contains several clauses making several acts or omissions to be offences. The learned counsel referred to clause (j) of the said Section and could not point to any other clause which is attracted to the facts of the 4 present case. According to clause (j) of Section 146, it shall be an offence if “a committee of a society or an officer or member thereof willfully neglects or refuses to do any act, or to furnish any information required for the purposes of this Act by the Registrar, or other person duly authorised by him or on his behalf.” Section 147 then prescribes punishment for this offence. 6. In this case, it is not shown that the Registrar had sought any information or had sought any copies from the accused persons. It is also not shown that applicant / complainant had been authorised by the Registrar to seek such information on his behalf. The learned counsel for the applicant submitted that restriction in clause (j) to requisitions of Registrar or his authorised representative is applicable only to furnishing information and not to willfully neglecting or refusing to do any act. He submitted that since Section 32(2) of the Act obliged the respondents to furnish information sought by him, offence was complete. Thus, in essence the learned counsel submits that willfully neglecting or refusing to 5 do any act prescribed under the Act would constitute an offence under Section 146(j) of the Act. Had it been so, it would not have been necessary for the legislature to define various offences in various clauses of Section 146, because they inevitably refer to acts or omissions prescribed under various provisions of the Act. For example, failure to invest funds in manner required under Section 70, or failure to comply with provisions of Section 75(2), 75(3) and 75(4) would also amount to refusal to do an act, constituting offence under Section 146(j) and would make clauses (c) and (f) of Section 146 redundant. If refusal to do an act in clause (j) were to be construed so widely then even the latter part of clause (j) itself would become redundant, since failure to furnish information would also amount to neglect or refusal to do an act. Therefore, refusal or neglect to do an act or to furnish information referred to in clause (j) would have to be in response to requisitions by the Registrar or person authorised by him in this behalf. 6 7. Section 148 of the Act provides that no prosecution under the Act can be filed, except with the previous sanction of the Registrar. Sanction of the Registrar has not been produced. It is, therefore, not clear as to how the judgments of the learned Additional Sessions Judge can be faulted. 8. In view of this, since there is no error in the judgments rendered by the learned Additional Sessions Judge, the revision applications are rejected. JUDGE RR.