( 1 ) IN this petition under Article 226 of the Constitution the petitioner who is one of the members of Lunawada Nagar Panchayat constituted under the provisions of the Gujarat Panchayats Act 1961 (hereinafter referred to as the said Act) has challenged a resolution passed by the said panchayat by which a notion of no confidence was passed against the Chairman of the Panchayat respondent no. 2 herein Kamlashanker Bhuleshwar Dave Mr. A. H. Mehta leaned advocate for the petitioner requested me to permit transposition of respondent no. 2 as petitioner no. 2 in order to meet the preliminary objection raised by the respondents to the effect that the person who is affected by no confidence motion was remaining in the background and was not interested in challenging the said resolution. Respondent no. 2 is accordingly permitted to be transposed as petitioner no. 2 at the oral request of Mr. Mehta. The impugned resolution passing motion of no confidence against petitioner no. 9 is dated 21-1-1983. The said resolution was passed by majority wherein 14 persons present and voting supported the said resolution while two persons including petitioner no. 2 voted against the resolution and one member remained neutral. The panchayat at the relevant time consisted of 18 members. The aforesaid resolution had been challenged on various grounds in the present petition. Notice was ordered to be issued in this petition and pursuant to the said notice the respondents who are members of the panchayat and who had voted in favour of the resolution have appeared through their learned advocates M/s. N. J. Mehta and Girish Patel.

( 2 ) MR. A. H. Mehta for the petitioners has raised the following four contentions in respect of the petition:-1. The notice for convening meeting for passing no confidence motion was served on the panchayat on 27-12-1982; while petitioner no. 2 Chairman by his Decision dated 10-12-1982 decided to call the special meeting to consider no confidence motion on 21-1-1983. Thus the Chairman had not called the meeting within 15 days of the date on which the notice reached the panchayat and consequently the impugned resolution was passed at the meeting which was null and void being violative of the statutory provisions of sec. 48 (5) (a) of the said Act; 2 The impugned resolution is also had on account of the further;. fact that three clear days notice was not given to the concerned members held on 21 as required by rule 5 of the Gujarat Gram and Nagar Panchayat (Procedure) Rules 1963 (hereinafter referred to as the said Rules) 3 As per rule 5 of the said Rules the Secretary of the panchayat has to call a meeting in question; while in the present case one Chandrakant Dave had called the said meeting. In this connection Mr. Mehta submitted that as per the decision of P. D. Desai J. in Special Civil Application No. 4386 of 1982 one Mr. P. J. Dave who was earlier appointed as the Secretary of the Panchayat was held to be entitled to resume his Duties as Secretary and consequently P. J. Dave only can be considered to be validly appointed Secretary of the Panchayat. Consequently the notice in the present case was issued by a person who was not entitled to act as Secretary at the relevant time and hence also the meeting of 21-1-1983 was null and void. 4 notice signed by the proposes and other 9 members as served on the panchayat for calling a meeting for considering no confidence motion was bad as it was not signed by requisite number of members who can move such notice and hence also all subsequent proceedings pursuant to the said notice were bad in law.

( 3 ) SO far as the first contention of Mr. Mehta is concerned it is necessary to keep in view of certain admitted and well established facts. As per sec. 48 any member who intends to move a notion of no confidence against the Sarpanch or Upa-Sarpanch or as the case may be the Chairman or Vice-Chair man may give notice thereof in the prescribed form to the panchayat conce