( 1 ) TWO question of considerable importance and significance arise on this petition. One is whether under the provisions of the Gujarat Panchayats Act 1961 and the Gujarat District Panchayats Election Rule 1962 made by the Government of Gujarat in exercise of its powers under section 323 of the Act it is open to an aggrieved person to challenge the validity of an election under section 24 on the ground that the nomination paper of a candidate was improperly rejected by the Returning Officer or is the decision of the Returning Officer regarding rejection of the nomination paper final in the sense that it cannot be impugned even as a ground for setting aside the election under section 24. The other is as to what is the consequence if more than one nomination paper in favour of a candidate are subscribed by the same proposer:- are all the nomination papers invalid in such a case or is the nomination paper first accepted by the Returning Officer valid and only the other nomination papers are invalid ? The determination of these questions depends on the true construction of certain provisions of the Act and the Rules but in order to appreciate how the questions arise it is necessary to briefly state the facts giving rise to the petition.

( 2 ) THE District Panchayat of Panchmahals District was to be constituted for the first time under the Act and for that purpose members were to be elected to the District Panchayat under section 15 (2 ). The date of election was therefore fixed by the District Development Officer as 20th February 1964 under section 18 (1 ). After appointing the date of election the District Development Officer acting under Rule 8 appointed 29th January 1964 as the east date for filing nomination papers and 31st January 1964 as the date for scrutiny of nomination papers. One of the electoral divisions for the election was Kalol electoral division. From this electoral division respondent No. 1 filed three nomination papers two on 28th January 1964 and the third on 29th January 1964 and they were numbered respectively 1 2 and 8. Petitioner No. 1 filed two nomination papers on 29 January 1964 and since they were filed immediately after the nomination papers bearing Nos. 1 and 2 they were given serial Nos. 3 and 4. Petitioner No. 2 filed three nomination papers on 29th January 1964 after the fililg of the nomination papers by petitioner No. 1 and the numbers given to the nomination papers filed by petitioner No. 2 were 5 6 and 7. Both the nomination papers of petitioner No. 1 were subscribed by the same proposer namely Parmar Mohansinh Sabursinh while out of the three nomination papers of petitioner No. 2 two bearing Nos. 5 and 6 were subscribed by the same proposer namely Thakore Kishorsinh Samatsinh. On 31st January 1964 at the time of scrutiny of the nomination papers an objection to the validity of the nomination papers of the petitioners was raised by the agent of respondent No. 1. The Returning Officer upholding the objection rejected the nomination papers of the petitioners. The ground on which the nomination papers of petitioner No. 1 were rejected was that they were subscribed by the same proposer in contravention of the second proviso to sub-rule (5) of Rule 10 and were therefore liable to be rejected under clause (c) of sub-rule (2) of Rule 14. The rejection of the nomination papers of petitioner No. 2 bearing Nos. 5 and 6 was also based on the same ground namely that they were subscribed by the same proposer. The nomination paper of petitioner No. 2 bearing No. 7 was rejected on a different ground but it is not necessary to refer to it as there is no dispute about the validity of that rejection. Since the nomination papers were rejected on the around of non-compliance with the second proviso to sub-rule (5) of Rule 10 the petitioners preferred the present petition against respondent No. 1 and the Returning Officer and the District Development Officer as respondents Nos. 2 and 3 respectiv