C.N. Ramachandran Nair, J.

This is the third round of litigation in this Court after two rounds in the Supreme Court pertaining to the same matter, i.e., election to the Board of Directors of the Thiruvalla East Co-operative Bank.

2. The election was first notified to be held on 24.10.2009. Even though the election so notified was postponed by the State Co-operative Election Commission and the same was published in newspapers, this Court as per an interim order directed holding of the election on the date initially fixed. However, this was done without public notice or newspaper publication. Therefore, only very few members participated in the election.

3. A Division Bench of this Court cancelled the election so held holding that the election held with participation of limited number of members does not serve the purpose of electing a proper representative body of the members. Special Leave Petition filed against the judgment was dismissed by the Supreme Court. In a Review Petition filed, the Division Bench substantially confirmed the judgment, but made certain modifications with regard to issuance of identification card, enrolment of fresh members etc. The review order was also challenged before the Supreme Court in Special Leave Petition, wherein the Supreme Court substantially confirmed the judgment with direction to hold the election within a time frame. It so happened that there was an amendment to the Co-operative Societies Act through Section 28-AA providing for reservation from various new categories to the Board of Directors of the Co-operative Banks, which required an amendment to the Bye-law. The question then raised before this Court was whether the judgment of the Division Bench of this Court, confirmed by the Supreme Court, directing holding of election could be enforced without reference to the amended provisions of the Act based on the original notification. The Division Bench of this Court vide judgment in W.A. No.445 of 2011 (2011(3) KLT SN 51 (C.No.48) held that the Bye-law has to be amended and the election to the Board of Directors of the Bank has to be held for electing the number of members with reservations in terms of the amended provisions. It may be noticed that under the amended provisions, the number of members of the Managing Committee had gone up to 13 as against 11 and out of 13, 7 went to the various reserved constituencies and 6 to the general constituencies. It was the specific finding of this Court that before holding the election, the Bye-laws have to be amended by holding General Body meeting to make it in tune with the amended provisions of the Act. Following the judgment, the Administrator, holding the powers of the Managing Committee, convened a General Body meeting wherein the Bye-law was amended with two-third majority and the same was registered on 17.8.2011. Necessary amendment was also carried out to the Election Sub-rules. It is thereafter that the election was notified, which is also challenged before the learned Single Judge in a fresh round of litigation, wherein the learned Single Judge stayed the election on the ground that the amendment made to the Bye-law by the General Body is not sufficient to hold a valid election to the Board of Directors of the Bank. It is against this stay order, two Writ Appeals are filed by the Bank and another two Writ Appeals by the State challenging the same order.

4. When the Writ Appeals against the interim order were posted before us, we felt that the Single Judge has virtually interdicted holding of election ordered by the Division Bench and confirmed by the Supreme Court and therefore, we posted the Writ Petitions also along with the Writ Appeals and heard all the cases together.

5. We heard Sri. George Poonthottam, counsel appearing for the appellant-Bank, Special Government Pleader Sri. D. Somasundaram for the State and Sri. S. Su