Gujarat High Court
Judgename :P.B.MAJMUDAR
HIRALAL G.SIYAL - Appellant
Versus
STATE - Respondent
S.C.A. 9518 of 2002
Decided On : 10/28/2002
Gujarat Municipalities Act – Section 263 (1) - Petitioners the Ex-Councillors of Porbandar Nagarpalika. By filing this petition, they are challenging the order passed by the State Government, by which the Porbandar Municipality is ordered to be dissolved under the provisions of Section 263 (1) of the Gujarat Municipalities Act and an Administrator is appointed to look after the affairs of the said Municipality. The aforesaid order of dissolving the said Municipality is passed on the ground that the Municipality has failed to discharge its duty – Held, At the time when the proceedings are initiated, there has to be some material, by which it can be said that at the time of taking action, the grounds are available, by which one can come to the conclusion that the Municipality has failed to exercise its powers or has abused the powers. Such ground certainly will have to be in existence at the time when proceedings are initiated and for that purpose, reference to some past incidents of some years back cannot be said to be a rational or reasonable ground. In my view, there was absolutely no rational material for the authorities for initiating the proceedings for dislodging a democratically elected Municipality in the aforesaid manner. In view of the same, in my view, the impugned order cannot be sustained, as, there is no material, by which the authority could have arrived at a subjective satisfaction for initiating the proceedings which can attract the provisions of Section 263 of the Act and on all these aforesaid grounds, the petition deserves to be allowed – Petition allowed.
( 1 ) THE petitioners herein are the Ex-Councillors of Porbandar Nagarpalika. By filing this petition, they are challenging the order dated 3. 9. 2002, passed by the State Government, by which the Porbandar Municipality is ordered to be dissolved under the provisions of Section 263 (1) of the Gujarat Municipalities Act and an Administrator is appointed to look after the affairs of the said Municipality. The aforesaid order of dissolving the said Municipality is passed on the ground that the Municipality has failed to discharge its duty. The proceedings were initiated by way of show cause notice dated 6th June, 2002. The said show cause notice was issued to the President of the Nagarpalika for the purpose of showing cause as to why proceedings under Section 263 (1) of the Act should not be initiated against the Nagarpalika. In the said show cause notice, eight grounds are mentioned for the purpose of initiating the proceedings under the said proviso. The grounds mentioned in the show cause notice are at page 61. Ground No. 1 relates to non-removing of the garbage and dirt from one Memanwada area. It is mentioned in the said ground that for failure in performing their duty in keeping the said area clean, complaint was filed against the Municipality under Section 133 of the Code of Criminal Procedure and when the matter was examined through the Mamlatdar, it was noticed that some false rojkams were prepared and subsequently, the person, who had signed the said Rojkam, gave complaint to the Deputy Collector that he had signed the Rojkam without proper verification. It is mentioned in the show cause notice that the Nagarpalika has not taken appropriate care in keeping the said area clean and that the Municipality had failed to maintain cleanliness and has failed to provide necessary facilities in connection with the healthy and hygienic atmosphere of the town. So far as ground No. 2 is concerned, it is in connection with non-maintaining appropriate roads, which are affected in view of underground cabling and also in view of some cyclone which had taken place some time back. Ground No. 3 is in connection with not taking care of catching hold of dogs and other animals even though Municipality is having appropriate staff and vehicles in this connection. It is also mentioned in the said notice that about 25 cattle died due to the negligence on the part of the Municipality as they were not given appropriate water, etc. and no medical facility was made available to such cattle and, accordingly, it is found that the Municipality has failed to carry out its duty. Ground No. 4 is regarding not providing appropriate drinking facilities to the citizens of the Town and accordingly, it is observed that the Municipality has failed to discharge its duty in distributing water in a proper manner. Ground No. 5 is regarding not maintaining sewerage and not cleaning the sewerage and non-maintenance of drainage system and that the Municipality is found to be negligent in maintaining the same. Ground No. 6 is in connection with certain irregularity in the matter of auctioning certain Municipal buses for which the President of the Municipality was also served with a notice. Ground No. 7 is in connection with renting out certain Municipal property without prior approval of the Competent Authority as well as regarding fixing upset price which resulted in monetary loss to the Municipality. The last ground mentioned in the notice is in connection with fixing rateable value in the matter of assessing house tax and it is found that in certain cases, the Municipality has reduced house tax to an extent of more than 50% and in certain cases, it is reduced to 90% to 98%. It was found that no reasons are given as to on what basis such reduction is made and that, accordingly, by reducing the house taxes, the Nagarpalika has abused its powers, which resulted in monetary loss to the Municipality. Each and every ground mentioned in the notice was repl
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