ORDER

1. These two writ petitions have challenged the steps initiated by the respondents for the purposes of election of delegates, of the Northern Zone Railway Employees Thrift and Credit Society Limited¹ . The aforesaid cooperative society is admittedly governed by the Multi State Cooperative Societies, Act 2002² read with the Rules and the Byelaws framed thereunder. The communication of 03 February 2020 set out the calendar for the election process which was to be undertaken. In terms of that notice, the election process was to commence on 03 February 2020 and the final list of candidates to be displayed on 09 March 2020. The notice further specified the number of delegates to be elected as being 120 and also set out their distribution amongst the various branches of the cooperative society.

2. It appears that the lead writ petition came up for consideration before a learned Judge of the Court on 23 March 2020. Issuing notice on the petition, the learned Judge observed that without going into the merits of the matter, bearing in mind the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic and the subsequent lock down, it would not be practicable to hold elections. The Court accordingly proce