The court determined that membership restrictions under Section 28 of the Maharashtra Co-operative Societies Act do not bar property ownership by a member and were excluded for housing societies, allowing respondent to pursue membership.

JUDGMENT :

AMIT BORKAR, J.

1. Since all the writ petitions raise identical questions of law and arise from the same set of facts, they are heard together and decided by this common judgment.

2. The petitioner has called in question the Judgment and Order dated 18 July 2015 passed by the Divisional Joint Registrar, whereby the revision application filed by the petitioner was dismissed. The said revision arose from proceedings under Section 23 (2) of the Maharashtra Co-operative Societies Act, 1960, by which membership was conferred on respondent No.1 company.

3. The facts leading to the filing of the present writ petitions may be stated thus. Respondent No.1 purchased five bungalows from their respective owners by registered sale deeds dated 7 April 2008. On the basis of these purchases, respondent No.1 applied for membership of the petitioner society. As the application was not decided within the prescribed period, respondent No.1 claimed that it acquired deemed membership of the petitioner society.

4. The petitioner society challenged the very transaction of sale deeds executed in favour of respondent No.1 by filing Dispute No.184 of 2008.

5. Thereafter, one Anil Mutha moved an application seeking conferment of membership on respondent No.1. Being aggrieved by the stand taken by the society, Anil Mutha preferred appeals before respondent No.2. These appeals were rejected on 4 April 2005. Respondent No.1 thereafter filed revision applications. By order dated 7 November 2014, respondent No.3 allowed the revisions. Aggrieved thereby, the petitioner filed Writ Petition Nos. 2690, 2691, 2692, and 2693 of 2015. These petitions came to be disposed of by order dated 14 February 2024, granting liberty to respondent No.1 to submit fresh applications for membership.

6. Pursuant to the order dated 14 February 2024, respondent No.1 submitted fresh applications for membership on 25 February 2024. The petitioner rejected these applications by order dated 20 May 2024. Respondent No.1 carried the matter in appeal before respondent No.2, which was allowed by Judgment and Order dated 17 April 2025. The petitioner then preferred revision applications before respondent No.3, which were dismissed by Judgment and Order dated 18 July 2025. It is in these circumstances that the present writ petitions have been filed.

7. Mr. Gole, learned Advocate for the petitioner, invited attention to Section 28 of the MCS Act and submitted that respondent No.1, by purchasing five bungalows out of the total fifteen bungalows of the society, effectively acquired more than one-fifth of the total authorised share capital of the society. Such acquisition, according to him, is impermissible under of the MCS Act. He further contended that the sale deeds are also hit by Section 23 of the Indian CONTRACT ACT , 1872, as contracts opposed to public policy. Referring to Section 154B-31 of the MCS Act, learned counsel submitted that the proceedings had commenced in the year 2008, much prior to the introduction of Chapter VIII-B in the Act. He contended that Section 154B(2), which clarifies that shall not apply to housing societies, would therefore have no application to the facts of the present case. By placing reliance on the second proviso to Section 22 of the MCS Act, learned counsel submitted that the State Government is empowered to issue a notification prescribing conditions for admission of a company as a member of an urban society. Such noti