Hon’ble Uma Nath Singh, J.—By way of this writ petition, the petitioners have prayed for issuance of a writ , order or direction in the nature of Certiorari for quashment of the orders dated 30.1.2010 and 4.12.2009 issued by the Joint Registrar, Co-operative Societies, U.P., Lucknow vide Annexure Nos. 1 and 2 herein on the grounds that these orders are void, illegal and without jurisdiction and also a writ , order or direction in the nature of Mandamus Commanding the respondents to treat the Northern Railway, Primary Cooperative Bank (for short ‘the NRPCB’) as a Multi State Cooperative Society, and thus, not to apply the provisions of the U.P. Cooperative Societies Act, 1965 (for short ‘the State Act of 1965’) besides other usual prayers of general nature.

2. During the course of hearing, at the very outset, learned counsel for respondents informed the Court that the letter dated 4.12.2009 and the order dated 30.1.2010 issued by the Joint Registrar, Cooperative Societies, U.P., Lucknow vide Annexures 1 and 2 have since been withdrawn, thus, now the one and only question that would survive for consideration of this Court would be as to whether in the obtaining facts and circumstances of the case, should this Court issue a writ, order or direction in the nature of Mandamus to command the respondents to treat the NRPCB as a Multi State Cooperative Society and resultantly, to restrain/desist from applying the provisions of the State Act of 1965.

3. The brief facts of the case leading to filing of this writ petition are that the Joint Registrar, U.P. Co-operative Societies, Lucknow, (respondent No. 3) issued a letter (Ref. No. 6560/Cooperative dated December 4, 2009) informing the NRP Co-operative Bank that till the Bank is registered with the Central Registrar, it would be subject to the prescription of the provisions of the State Act of 1965. Thereafter, the respondent No. 3 issued another order dated 30.1.2010 in exercise of powers conferred under Notification No. 3328-C/12 C.A.-25 (1)/67 dated 24.6.1969 read with Notification No. 65/49-200-148 (5)/2006 dated 26.7.2006 in terms of Section 128 of the State Act of 1965 to say that the Chairman and Secretary of the Managing Committee of the NRPCB shall reconsider its decisions taken in the meeting dated 23.1.2010 and inform him accordingly before 15.2.2010, and till then, he stayed the decisions taken in the said meeting.

4. It appears from the background of the NRPCB that it was registered as a Society under the provisions of the State Act of 1965 with its area of operation being as under :

1. Lucknow Division, C.C.S. Office Varanasi.

2. Moradabad Division.

3. Allahabad Division and Diesel Loco Motive Workshop, Varanasi, concrete sleeper Plant Allahabad concrete sleeper Plant, Khanishpur, Senior Tele Communication Engineer, Microwave Department.

4. Loco work Shop, Lucknow.

5. Carriage and Wagon Workshop, Lucknow and other Departments such as Electric, Stores, Medical and P.P.F. Department.

5. The pleadings of the writ petition would show that at present there are more than 80,000 members of the NRPCB, who are spread over the State of U.P. and Uttarakhand/Uttaranchal and it has a working capital/corpus of over 250 crores. The management of the Bank is controlled and governed by a Sanchalak Mandal comprising of 15 members including a Chairman and four Vice Chairmen. The Divisional Railway Manager concerned becomes the Ex-officio Chairman and four Vice Chairmen and ten members of the Managing Committee are elected by the General body. With the coming into force of the U.P. Reorganisation Act, 2000 (for short ‘the Act of 2000’), passed by the Parliament, the State of Uttarakhand/Uttranchal was carved out and created, thus, the area of operation of the Bank/Society ceased to be strictly limited to the present territorial jurisdiction of the State of U.P. In this background, the petitioners raised the demand for conferring the status of a Multi State Co-operative Society on the