Members must raise objections within a reasonable time, and other members cannot raise objections on behalf of defaulters without specific authorization or provisions in the by-laws or the Act.

1) Rule. Rule is made returnable forthwith. Heard finally by consent of the parties.

2) The petitioners' objection to their exclusion in the voters' list of the society-respondent No.4 have been considered/accepted by the Returning Officer-respondent No.4, in view of the provisions of the Maharashtra Co-operative Societies Act, 1960. However, by the present petition, the action of respondents of finalising the voters' list by deleting the other 804 members has been challenged and thereby sought declaration that the final list of the voters published on 20 January 2015 be declared as illegal and bad in law, further pray to prepare and republish the revised final voters' list, who have been members in the list of voters as on 31 October, 2012. Thereby, also pray to set aside the communication dated 17 January, 2015. The prayer is also made to stay the process of election programme as declared by respondent No.5 on 13 January, 2015 based upon the impugned final voters' list.

3) The learned counsel appearing for respondent No.4society has raised a preliminary objection, apart from their reply/objections to the averments so made by the petitioners by affidavit dated 10 February 2015. The relevant para-4 is as under:

This Respondent further states that the Petitioners have no locus to maintain this petition as the names of the 3 Petitioners are already included in Final Voters List published on 20.01.2015 and the names of the Petitioner No.1 appears at Sr. No. 8 and name of the petitioner No.3 at Sr. No.20 in the Supplementary List and the name of the Petitioner No.2-Prakash Sadashiv Patil at Sr. No.286 and shown as Defaulter and therefore, the present Writ Petition which makes a grievance against the deletion of the Voters from the provisional and/or final list cannot be maintained at the instance of the Petitioners.

4) The relevant rules which have been in force with effect from 11.09.2014 called The Maharashtra Cooperative Societies Election to the Committee Rules, 2013 (The rules), Part-III (Preparation of Electoral Roll), ranging from Rules 6 to 11 deal with the aspect of publication of a provisional list of voters by the society, having individuals as members, the procedure of providing the particulars of the members to the provisional list of voters, and claims and objections to be heard by the concerned District Cooperative Election Officer within the prescribed period. This Chapter also provides the obligations of the society to publish the provisional list of the voters. It is obligatory on the part of the society to give particulars of individual member with necessary identity enabling them to treat as 'registered voters'. The provisions are also made for inviting the claims and objections and/or omission or error in respect of the names, address, particulars in the provisional list of voters, so that final list of the voters, as required, can be published for the purpose of election and/or other related matters. This is certainly in the background of the M.C.S. Act, acts, rules and the bylaws of the society, which deals and govern with various kinds of members and their statutory rights including a publication of their names in the final list and to vote for the society election.

5) The relevant Sections 26 and 27 and provisions of the Maharashtra Co-operative Societies Act, 1960 are as under:

26. Rights and duties of members –

(1) A member shall be entitled to exercise such rights as provided in the Act, rules and bylaws;

Provided that, no member shall exercise the rights, until he has made such payment to the society in respect of membership, or acquired such interest in the society, as may be prescribed and specified under the by-laws of the society, from time to time;

Provided also that, in any election conducted immediately after the date of the commencement of the Maharashtra Co-operative Societies (Amendment) Act, 2013, (Mah.XVI of 2013), all the existing members of the society shall be eligible for voting, unless