- (1.) THIS is a dispute over the election of respondent No. 5 to a seat in a Gram Panchayat, known as Hamirbati No. 1 Gram Panchayat. The petitioner was also a candidate in the said election and both the petitioner and the respondent No. 5 secured equal number of votes, namely, 65 votes each. There being a tie, the Presiding Officer of the election decided to have the selection made by lot. The method employed by him was to spin a coin, with one side thereof adopted by each of the candidates, and to declare that candidate elected whose side of the coin fell uppermost. As a result of the spin of the coin the respondent No. 5 was declared elected. Dissatisfied with the manner of election the petitioner, who lost in the lot, moved this Court, under Article 226 of the Constitution, and obtained this Rule.
(2.) IT was contended on behalf of the petitioner that Rule 22 of the Rules under the West Bengal Panchayat Act, 1956 made an arbitrary delegation of powers to the Presiding Officer by authorising him to hold lot in such manner as he may deem fit and should be declared to be bad for that reason. Rule 22 of the West Bengal Panchayat Act reads as follows: "22. Declaration of the result of election of members of a Gram Panchayat:-The Presiding Officer shall declare on the day on which the poll is taken the name of such candidates as have the largest number of votes to be duly elected. When the number of votes secured by two or more persons are equal, selection shall be made from such candidates by lot in such manner as the Presiding Officer may deem fit. The Presiding Officer shall forward the names of members so elected to the District Panchayat Officer sending a copy thereof to the Returning Officer. "
(3.) THE expression 'lot' has a well-known meaning. In the Oxford English Dictionary the meaning of the word is given as, "an object (appusually a piece of wood) used in a widely diffused ancient method of deciding disputes, dividing plunder or property, selecting persons for an office or duty, etc. , by an appeal to chance or the divine agency supposed to be concerned in the results of change. The 'lots', each bearing the special mark of one of the competitors, were placed in a receptacle (in Homeric Greece a helmet); according the Greek procedure the vessel was shaken, the winning lot being that which fell out first; in Scandinavia (see Vigf, S. V. hlutr) the winning lot was drawn out by an uninterested party. In Eng. (exc. in rare modern instances, chiefly translations from ancient langs.) the word in this sense occurs only in the phr. to cast, draw (also lay, put, send, throw, warp) lots (or. lot);";