JUDGMENT - MANE A.D., J.:—There involves an interesting point of law in this writ petition.

2. This writ petition is directed against the rejection of nomination form of the petitioner by the Returning Officer, respondent No. 4 of Service Co-operative Society, Bhokar District Nanded (for short, the Society). The petitioner is the member of the society. The petitioner was the Chairman of the society.

The respondent No. 4 is appointed as the Returning Officer to hold the elections to the Managing Committee of the Society. The petitioner submits that his nomination form was rejected by the Returning Officer on the ground that the petitioner who was removed as the member of the said society by the Registrar under section 78(1) of the Maharashtra Co-operative Societies Act, 1960 (for short, the Act), was not eligible to be re-elected as a member of the society till the period of expiry of next full term of the Committee from the date on which he has been so removed.

3. In the context, it is necessary to set out a few facts which are germane to the question involved in this petition. The respondent No. 3, the Assistant Registrar, Co-operative Societies, Taluka Bhokar, issued the show cause notice dated 6-4-1994 to the petitioner as the Chairman of the Managing Committee of the society in exercise of his powers under section 78(1) of the Act. By his order dated 17-5-1994 the Assistant Registrar, Co-operative Societies, superseded the Managing Committee of the society under section 78(1)(a)(i) of the Act.

4. That order of supersession was challenged by the petitioner and others in Writ Petition No. 1171 of 1994. In that writ petition this Court while disposing of the petition passed an order on 22-6-1994 directing the Assistant Registrar, Co-operative Societies to hold the elections of the society within a period of 40 days from the date of finalisation of the voters' list of the society. It may be stated that though the petitioner challenged the order of supersession but by that time the term of the committee and the elected members of the committee had already expired and therefore, the petition came to be disposed of with the aforesaid directions.

5. In pursuance of the said directions the Respondent No. 4 published the election programme on 17-8-1994 as per the programme the date of filing the nomination form was from 18th to 24th August, 1994 and the date of scrutiny was fixed on 25-8-1994. 20th September, 1994 is the date of polling and declaration of results.

6. The Petitioner submitted his nomination form on 24-8-1994. On the date of scrutiny of the nomination forms, the respondent No. 4 rejected the nomination form filed by the petitioner on the ground that the petitioner was not eligible to be re-elected as member of the society till the expiry of the period of next full term of the Committee from the date on which he was so removed under section 78(1)(a)(i) of the Act.

7. Therefore, the important question which arises is whether the proviso to Clause (b) of sub-section (1) of section 78 of the Act applies in a case like the present. It would be convenient to extract the provisions of section 78(1) of the Act so far as relevant as follows :

“78. (1) If, in the opinion of the Registrar, the Committee of any society or any member of such Committee makes default, or is negligent in the performance of the duties imposed on it or him by this Act or the rules or the bye-laws, or commits any act which is prejudicial to the interests of the society or its members or wilfully disobeys directions issued by the State Government, or by the Registrar for the purpose of securing proper implementation of co-operative policy and development programme approved or undertaken by the State Government or is otherwise not discharging its or his functions properly and diligently or where a situation has arisen in which the Committee or any member of such committee refuses or has ceased to discharge its or his functions and deligently and the business o

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