The court ruled that the suspension of an elected representative must not be discriminatory, emphasizing the shared responsibility of all officials in the verification process.

Order :

VINIT KUMAR MATHUR, J.

1. Due to the paucity of time, the present writ petition itself is not being decided and therefore, the arguments have been advanced and heard on the stay application.

2. Heard learned counsel for the parties on stay application.

3. Mr. Sandeep Shah, learned Senior Counsel for the petitioner submits that the petitioner is an elected representative holding the post of Chairman, Municipal Board, Merta City. Learned Senior Counsel further submits that vide order dated 30.08.2024, the petitioner has been placed under suspension under Section 39 of the Rajasthan Municipalities Act, 2009. He further submits that the petitioner had put only his signatures on the Pattas issued in favour of the two individuals after the entire process was completed by the authorities subordinate to him including the Executive Officer. Learned Senior Counsel further submits that right from the submission of the application till the grant of Patta, the entire proceedings are required to be undertaken by the Junior Engineer, ATP, Senior Assistant including Executive Officer. He further submits that when the proceedings reached to the Chairman, the petitioner has mentioned that the Patta should only be issued after holding an inquiry and going through the entire documents and the record of the case. After passing this order, the subordinate authorities were under an obligation to check the entire documents and after examining the same, the Pattas were prepared, on which, the Executive Officer placed his signatures and thereafter, the prepared Patta was placed before the petitioner for his signatures. He further submits that the petitioner was under the bona fide impression that the entire documents were properly checked by the Government authorities, including Executive Officer and therefore, he had placed the signatures on Patta.

4. Learned Senior Counsel further submits that as per the provisions of the Rajasthan Municipalities Act, 2009, the entire proceedings of issuing Patta are required to be undertaken by a number of officials who are working in the Municipal Board and thereafter finally when the entire record reaches the Chairman, he puts his signatures on the file for issuance of Patta. He further submits that immediately after the complaint was received for the two Pattas which were wrongly issued, he initiated steps for cancellation of the same. He further submits that all other persons including the Executive Officer, ATP and other officials, who have prepared the record and processed the case of those two individuals for issuance of Patta, have not been placed under suspension and merely notices have been issued in their case for the proposed disciplinary action. Learned Senior Counsel, in these circumstances, submits that the petitioner is an elected representative and has been given a discriminatory treatment viz- a-viz those persons who are actually involved in checking the documents for issuing the Patta in question.

5. Learned Senior Counsel further undertakes that the petitioner is ready to submit an undertaking before the competent authority to the effect that during the course of the judicial inquiry, he will not influence the witnesses and will not attempt to tamper the evidence and, therefore, the suspension order may be stayed during the pendency of judicial inquiry. To buttress his contention, learned Senior Counsel relied upon certain other orders passed by the State Government, wherein such undertaking was taken from an elected representative during the course of judicial inquiry and suspension order in those cases was revoked. He, therefore, prays that the stay application may be allowed and during the pendency of the judicial inquiry and the present writ petition, the suspension order dated 30.08.2024 may be stayed.

6. Per contra, Mr. Rajesh Panwar, learned Senior Counsel-cum- AAG for the State vehemently opposed the submissions made by the learned Senior Counsel for the petitioner and submits that the S