A.D. Koshal, J. - (1.) BY this judgment I shall dispose of three petitions under Articles 226 and 227 of the Constitution of India, being Civil Writs Nos. 2743, 2776 and 3941 of 1970, in each one of which the Petitioner is the Sarpanch of a Gram Panchayat constituted under the Punjab Gram Panchayat Act, 1952 (hereinafter referred to as the Act) and seeks the issuance of a writ quashing the order passed by the Deputy Commissioner concerned directing his (the Petitioner's) suspension from the office of Sarpanch under Sub -section (1) of Section 102 of the Act. In each of the petitions the impugned order is attacked on various grounds of which only the following have been urged before me at the bar: (a) No suspension could legally be ordered except so as to take effect during the course of an enquiry envisaged by Sub -section (2) of the section above mentioned. The impugned order directs firstly, the suspension of the Petitioner and, secondly (in its concluding portion) that an enquiry he held against the Petitioner in respect of specified charges. The direction regarding suspension having preceded that relating to the enquiry, the former contravenes the provisions of Sub -section (1) ibid. (b) There is no provision in the Act which authorises the Government to appoint someone who has not been elected as a Sarpanch to act as such during the time of suspension of a Sarpanch. That being so, no Sarpanch can be suspended inasmuch as his suspension would leave the Panchayat concerned without a Sarpanch and this is a situation which could not have been intended by the legislature to prevail. The provisions of Sub -section (1) ibid, therefore, come into conflict with and cannot take precedence over the other provisions of the Act. (c) A Sarpanch being an elected representative of the people of the village cannot be summarily suspended by the Deputy Commissioner. There is no contractual relationship between him and the Government, much less that of master and servant. And if that be so, the Government or the Deputy Commissioner could have no power to suspend him.
(2.) IN Civil Writ No. 3941 of 1970 an additional contention has been raised on behalf of the Petitioner. One of the two charges in respect of which the impugned order directs an enquiry against him reads: That by misusing his office he is preventing the State Government from exercising its legal rights over the mines, although the Court has already decided in favour of the State Government in the matter. The contention is that this charge is intended to coerce the Petitioner into giving up a claim made by him as Sarpanch of the village to the effect that certain mineral rights vest in that Panchayat and not in the Government - -a claim which is the subject -matter of an appeal pending in the Supreme Court of India.
(3.) IN support of ground (a) learned Counsel for the Petitioners have relied upon Shri Ujagar Singh v. State of Punjab and Ors., I.L.R. (1969) 1 P&H 59 (F.B.) :, 1969 C.L.J. 652 (F.B.) in which it was held on an interpretation of Sub -section (1) and (2) ibid that it is only during the course of an enquiry envisaged by Sub -section (2) that the Deputy Commissioner may exercise his power of suspension and that if no such enquiry has been ordered, occasion for the exercise of the power of suspension by the Deputy Commissioner under Sub -section (1) would not arise. This authority has no application to the facts of the cases before me in each one of which the enquiry and the suspension in question are covered by directions contained in a single order of the Deputy Commissioner which, in order to be properly interpreted, must be read as a whole. Thus, viewed the suspension and the enquiry in each case are simultaneous. And if that be so, it cannot be said that when the direction regarding the suspension was given, no enquiry was pending or that the suspension was not made "during the course of an enquiry" as envisaged by Sub -section (1) ibid. Consequently I find no force in ground a;