Bifurcation of Grama Panchayats requires judicial discretion and is not solely based on population; the 'reasonably practicable' standard allows for executive interpretation and policy-making that courts must respect.

JUDGMENT :

KRISHNA S. DIXIT, J.

This Intra-Court Appeal seeks to call in question a learned Single Judge’s order dated 21.06.2024, whereby Appellants’ WP(C) No.22668/2016 seeking quashment of Commissioner’s order No.23098 dated 09.12.2016 has been negatived. By the said order of the Commissioner, Appellants’ representation for the bifurcation of Khanguria Grama Panchayat and for creation of Sampur Grama Panchayat has been rejected.

2. Having heard learned Counsel for the Appellants and having perused the Appeal papers, we decline indulgence in the matter for the following reasons:

2.1. Section 3 of the Odisha Grama Panchayats Act, 1964 vests power in the State Government inter alia for the creation of Grama Panchayats keeping in view certain social parameters. This it does by issuing a notification published in the gazette by enlisting group of villages that would become the Grama Panchayat. The said body will be named after one of such constituent villages. Sub-section 3 prescribes the population as a parameter for the exercise of this power and it reads as under:

“…(3) No Grama shall, so far as may be reasonably practicable, be constituted with a population of less than two thousand and more than ten thousand but in no event shall a village be divided and a part thereof included within a Grama.”

2.2. The vehement submission of learned counsel representing the Appellants that once the population exceeds ten thousand, such a Grama Panchayat as of necessity has to be bifurcated and thereby a new Panchayat needs to be established, is bit difficult to countenance and reasons for this are not far to seek:

i. The language of Sub-section 3 of Section 3 of the 1964 Act is conditional and selectively mandatory, as would come out from the text. This Sub-section employees the expression ‘so far as may be reasonably practicable’. Thus, it is not that once the population exceeds the limit, the State Government has to constitute a new Grama Panchayat by bifurcation. An argument to the contrary would rob off the significance of the above expression and render it otiose. In the normative interpretative process, a Court cannot do it. If the legislature intended that no discretion should avail to the State Government in the matter of bifurcation, this expression would not have figured in the provision.

ii. Creation, alteration and bifurcation of Grama Panchayats is a matter of policy. The language of Section 3 of the Act has been accordingly structured. What all would constitute ‘practicable’ is a matter, which does not admit judicial assessment. It is for the Executive to take a decision in its wisdom acquired through accumulated experience. A Writ Court cannot run a race of opinions with the Executive, in matters like this.

iii. It hardly needs to be stated that doctrine of separation of powers is recognized in our Constitution vide Ram Jawaya Kapur v. State of Punjab , AIR 1955 SC 549 . A Constitution Bench of the Apex Court in Indira Nehru Gandhi v. Raj Narain , AIR 1975 SC 1590 has held that this doctrine is a basic feature of the Constitution. Each organ of the State has to show due deference to the decisions of other. Judicial review is not a panacea to all administrative decisions of the Government, notwithstanding arguable infirmities. Remedy for such wrongs lie not in the Court halls but in electoral process that happens with fair degree of regularity.

2.3. Learned Single Judge has rightly observed that under the Notification No.10729, vide paragraphs 5 & 6, the population is not the sole criteria for reconstitution or bifurcation of the existing Grama Panchayat. The said paragraphs read as under:

“5. Grama Panchayats having population around 10,000 or more shall be bifurcated and reorganized basing on geographical location, natural barrier and administrative convenience for constitution of a new Grama Panchayat.

6. B