JUDGMENT :

JASGURPREET SINGH PURI, J.

1. The present petition has been filed under Articles 226/227 of the Constitution of India seeking issuance of a writ in the nature of mandamus directing respondent No. 2 to comply with the instructions issued by respondent No. 1 vide office order dated 21.11.2023 (Annexure P-2) and office order dated 01.02.2024 (Annexure P-3).

2. Learned counsel for the petitioner, while briefly outlining the facts of the case, submitted that respondent No. 2, namely the Postal and RMS Employees Co-operative Bank Ltd., Ambala, is a Multi-State Co-operative Society, of which the petitioner is a member. The said society is governed by the provisions of the Multi-State Co-operative Societies Act, 2002 (hereinafter referred to as “the Act”). The tenure of the Board of Directors of respondent No. 2-Society was due to expire on 21.10.2023, and before expiry of the aforesaid tenure of the Board of Directors, the Society itself, through its CEO, conducted elections for the Board of Directors on 08.10.2023, which was about 12 days before expiry of the tenure of the Board of Directors. It is the aforesaid election to the above- mentioned Board of Directors, conducted on 08.10.2023, which is under challenge in the present writ petition.

3. He submitted that the aforesaid election was conducted in violation of the provisions of Section 45 of the Act, which was amended w.e.f. 03.08.2023 and by way of the said amendment, it was provided that the Central Government shall establish an authority to be known as the Co-operative Election Authority for conducting elections. He also referred to Section 45 (I) which provides for functions of Authority and it has been mentioned therein that the Authority which is to be constituted shall discharge the functions of conducting the elections of the multi-State Co-operative Society. He submitted that once the amendment came into force w.e.f. 03.08.2023, the power to conduct elections of a Multi-State Co-operative Society is vested only with the Authority to be constituted under the provisions of Section 45 of the Act, as aforesaid and no other authority could have conducted the elections. Whereas, in the present case, the elections to the Board of Directors were conducted on 08.10.2023, i.e., after the aforesaid amendment had come into force and therefore the said elections were not in accordance with law and could not have been given effect to.

4. He also submitted that, vide Annexures P-1 and P-2, the Government of India, Ministry of Cooperation, had written that the elections can be conducted only by the Co-operative Election Authority in view of the amendment to Section 45 of the Act. However, no action was taken by the respondents, and therefore continuation of the Board of Directors of the aforesaid Co-operative Society is in violation of law and cannot be permitted to continue.

5. He further submitted that, with respect to some of the societies, the Central Government has already cancelled the elections where the societies had conducted the elections on their own. However, so far as the present society i.e. respondent No. 2 is concerned, the aforesaid elections to the board of directors have still not been cancelled and therefore directions be issued to the respondent-Registrar, Co- operative Societies to cancel the elections which were conducted in the aforesaid society.

6. On the other hand, learned counsel appearing on behalf of the respondents, namely Mr. Vijay Pal, Advocate; Mr. Vivek Sheoran, Advocate; Mr. Udit Garg, Addl. A.G., Haryana; Mr. Himanshu Arora, Advocate; and Mr. Simranjit Singh Sidhu, Advocate, jointly submitted that the present petition is misconceived and deserves to be dismissed.

7. Learned counsel appearing on behalf of respondents No. 4 to 7 submitted that, in pursuance of the aforesaid amendment carried out in Section 45 of the Act w.e.f. 03.08.2023, an Authority was required to be constituted, but the same was not constituted at that time and was constituted