- (1.)The petitioner herein had filed Writ Petition under Article 226 of the Constitution in the High Court of Madhya Pradesh, Principal Seat at Jabalpur, in the nature of Public Interest Litigation. In that petition, the petitioner has challenged the validity of Section 3 of the M.P. State Co-operative Societies Act, 1960 (hereinafter referred to as the Act) to the extent this provision permits the State Government to appoint the Registrar of the Co-operative Society, as well as Additional Registrar, Joint Registrar, Deputy Registrar, Assistant Registrar etc. The petitioner also challenged proviso added to Section 77 (3)(b) and Section 77 (6) of the Act as unconstitutional. To put it succinctly, the grievance of the petitioner was that these provisions provide for appointment of persons not having any education in law, though discharging the judicial function, which was impermissible and ex-facie violative of Art. 14 and 21 of the Constitution. The petitioner had even given suggestion to the effect that the appointments of these presiding officers be made in manner presiding officers of the labour courts are appointed.
(2.)The Writ Petition was contested by the respondents on various grounds. In the first place, the very maintainability of the Writ Petition was assailed on the ground that the petitioner had not approached the High Court with clean hands and had suppressed the fact that he was a chronic litigant whose various cases were pending before the Cooperative Court. Therefore, he had personal interest in the matter. As such, he was not competent to file the Writ Petition in the nature of PIL. On merits, it was submitted that such Registrar, Addl. Registrar etc. function under the supervision of M.P. State Cooperative Tribunal (in short 'the Tribunal'). The Chairman of the Tribunal is a judicial officer. Again, both these authorities function under the over all superintendence of the High Court under Art.227 of the Constitution. In several other enactments the administrative officers perform such quasi judicial functions.
(3.)After considering the submissions of both the parties, the High Court repelled the challenge of the petitioner to the vires of the aforesaid provisions of the Act and dismissed the Writ Petition filed by the petitioner.