M. P. CHINNAPPA, J.

( 1 ) THE petitioner is challenging the validity of Section 11 (1) (ix) of the karnataka Agricultural Produce Marketing (Regulation) Act, 1966 (for short, 'the Act') to the extent of providing voting right to members nominated under this section.

( 2 ) HEARD Sri KM. Nataraj, the learned Counsel for the petitioner; Sri b. H. Satish, High Court Government Pleader for respondent 1 and Sri b. G. Sridharan, Advocate for respondent 2.

( 3 ) THE brief facts which are necessary to dispose of this petition are as follows: the Act was promulgated with the object of providing better facilities to the agriculturists by regulating, establishing and administering the markets for agricultural produces and the matters connected therein in the State of Karnataka. The election to the respondent 2-Committee was held on 21-3-2001 to constitute a Committee under Section 11 of the Act. According to Section 11, eleven members will have to be elected from the agriculturists' constituency and one member each shall be elected from the traders constituency, representative of Co-operative Marketing Society, representative of Co-operative Processing Societies and one officer who is not below the rank of the Secretary of the concerned Marketing committee is nominated by the Director of Agricultural Marketing, who shall have no right to vote under Section 41 or Section 44 of the Act and the remaining three members shall be nominated by the State Government who shall have right to vote in all the meetings of the Committee. Section 11 (1) (ix) of the Act was inserted in 1997 which empowers the state Government to nominate three persons as its representatives in the Committee with all rights and privileges of the elected members irrespective of their qualification and mode of acquiring the membership. Voting power of these 3 nominated members is challenged by the petitioner in this case.

( 4 ) THE respondent 2 also filed objections contending that the petition is not maintainable. The persons who are nominated as members under section 11 (1) (ix) are the members who have voting power which is validly conferred upon them. The State Government has the power of superintendence over the functioning of the market yards in the matter of administration within the purview of the Act, Rules and Bye-laws. The contention that the Government nominates persons irrespective of their qualification and ability to serve the agriculturists etc. without any guidelines is denied. It is a misnomer to call the nominated persons as unequals when compared to elected members. There is no discrimination between the member nominated under Section 11 (1) (viii) and 11 (1) (ix ).

( 5 ) THE learned Counsel for the petitioner has questioned this Section 1 l (1) (ix) on 3 grounds.

( 6 ) FIRSTLY, he contended that it is violative of Article 14 of the Constitution. The main contention of the petitioner is that according to Section 11 (1) of the Act, the members who were elected will have voting power and the persons who are not nominated under Section 11 (1) (viii) have no power to vote. On the other hand, those 3 members nominated under section 11 (1) (ix) only have voting power along with the elected members. That is discriminatory and therefore, this voting power is liable to be quashed.

( 7 ) REPELLING this argument, the learned Counsel for the 2nd respondent submitted that from the reading of Section 11 (1) (viii) and 11 (1) (ix), it is clear that the officer nominated by the Director is not a member as defined under Section 2 (25) of the Act. From the bare reading of Section 11 (1) (viii) it is clear that the word 'member' is conspicuous in its absence. But in regard to sub-sections (1) to (7) and (9) the word 'member' is present in all the sub-sections. Therefore, as rightly pointed out by the learned Counsel for the respondent, the officer nominated by the Director under clause (viii) to sub-section (1) of Section 11 is not a member and therefore, he was not authoris

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