- (1.) THE following four questions have been referred by a Division Bench of this court to a larger Bench: (1) Whether Rule 2 of the Rules made by the Collector, Ganganagar under Section 22 of the Rajasthan Municipalities Act, 1959, lays down the requirement that the draft electoral rolls along with the notices must inter alia, be placed at the office of the Municipality concerned and at two conspicuous places in each ward therein under Clauses (a) and (b)of the said rule, or, this provision relates only to the publication of the notice? (2) If the answer to the above question is in favour of the petitioners, whether the want of publication of the draft electoral rolls in strict conformity with the aforesaid rules amounts to a defect of a fundamental nature in the process preliminary to the election, and if so, whether such a defect would, by itself, be sufficient to vitiate the election in a writ petition? (3) Whether Anop Chand's case (supra) correctly lays down the law in so far as it confined the operation of the decision of the Supreme Court in radhey Shyam's case (supra) to that class of cases only where there may be no rules as regards the revision of the electoral rolls, or its principle would equally apply to such cases where rules in that behalf may have been framed and are fundamental and have been breached? (4) Whether the cases, for example, Jugal Kishore v. The State of rajasthan (supra) and Ram Krishna v. The State of Rajasthan (supra), which have taken the view that no amount of violation of the rules framed by the Collector for the revision of the electoral rolls can vitiate an election and that it is only the total absence of the rules for revision thereof that can vitiate an election, correctly lay down the law? these questions have arisen in the writ petition filed by Atma Singh and others for declaring the elections held on 30th December, 1963 for the general and reserved seats to the Municipal Board. Ganganagar null and void and also for certain other reliefs which need not be mentioned. The election took place in accordance with the provisions of the Rajasthan Municipalities Act, 1959 (Act No. 13 of 1959) (hereinafter called 'the Act' ). Chapter II of the Act provided for the constitution and government of municipalities in Rajasthan. It has been divided into several parts. Part I consists of three Sections, 4 to 6, and makes provisions for delimitation of the municipality for declaration of any area so delimited as a municipality and constitution of municipal board. Part II consists of Sections 7 to 12 in which arc contained provisions relating to composition of Board and terms of the member and vesting of the Municipal government in the Board. Part III consists of Sections 18 and 14 and contains provisions for division of a Municipality into wards for the purpose of holding elections. Part IV consists of Sections 15 to 22 and contains provisions for the preparation of electoral rolls. Part V consists of Sections 23 to 33 and contains provisions relating to conduct of elections. Part VI consists of Sections 34 to 60 and contains provisions relating to election petitions. The other parts contain provisions on other matters. The provisions of this Chapter show that, except in cases mentioned in Section 10, the municipal board in which the municipal government is to vest shall consist of elected members and such co-opted members as are mentioned therein. The point for determination before the division Bench was whether the electoral rolls were prepared in accordance with the provisions of this Chapter or not and if there was any irregularity in the preparation of the electoral rolls, what was the effect of such irregularity on the elections held on the 30th December 1963 in which the respondents to the petition were elected. As already mentioned, the electoral rolls under the Act are to be prepared in accordance with the provisions of Sections 15 to 22 contained in Part iv. These sections may be quoted in extenso: " (4) Electoral Rolls. 15. Elections on the basis of adult suffrage --The election of the members of a board shall be on the basis of adult suffrage. 16. Electoral rolls for every ward.-- (1) There shall be an electoral roll for every ward, which shall be prepared in accordance with the provisions of this Act under the supervision of the Collector. (2) For purposes of preparation of such electoral roll the electoral rolls prepared for the State Assembly Constituencies under and in accordance with the provisions of the Representation of the People Act, 1950 (Central Act XLIII of 1950), relatable to the area comprised in a ward shall be adopted and published in the manner prescribed and upon its publication it shall, subject to any alteration, addition or modification, made under or in accordance with this Act, be the electoral roll for the ward prepared in accordance with this Act. (3) Where any addition, omission, alteration or other amendment is made under the Representation of the People Act, 1950 (Central Act xliii of 1950), or the rules framed thereunder, in the said Assembly rolls relatable to the are of the ward, a similar amendment shall be made in the corresponding electoral roll of the ward. (17 ). Qualifications for electors Subject to the provisions of Section 18, every person who is qualified to be registered in the State Assembly electoral roll relatable to the area comprised in the ward, or whose name is entered therein, shall be entitled to be registered in the electoral roll of the ward, (18 ). Disqualifications for registration in an electoral roll.-- (1) A person shall be disqualified for registration in an electoral roll prepared under this Act, if he is disqualified for registration in the State Assembly rolls. (2) The name of any person who becomes so disqualified after registration shall forthwith be struck off the electoral roll prepared under this Act : provided that the name of any person struck off the electoral roll by reason of disqualification under Sub-section (1) shall forthwith be reentered in that roll if such disqualification is, during the period such roll is in force, removed under the provisions of this Act or under any other law authorising such removal. (19 ). Registration to be in one ward and in one, place:-- (1) No person shall be entitled to be registered in the electoral roll for more than one ward in the same municipality. (2) No person shall be entitled to be registered in an electoral roll more than once. (20 ). Returning Officer--The electoral roll for each ward shall be prepared by a Returning Officer who shall be such officer as the Collector may appoint. (21 ). Annual revision of electoral roll The electoral roll for each ward shall be revised every year in accordance with the provisions of this Act. (22 ). Order regarding electoral rolls.--The Collector may by order published in the official Gazette and in such other manner as may he prescribed, make provision in respect of the following matters concerning the electoral rolls, namely: (a) the date on which the electoral rolls first prepared and subsequently prepared under this Act shall come into force and their period of operation (b) the correction of any existing entry in the electoral rolls on the application of the elector concerned; (c) the correction of clerical or printing errors in the electoral rolls; (d) the inclusion in the electoral rolls of the name of any person- (i) whose name is included in the State Assembly rolls for the area relatable to the ward, but is not included in the electoral roll of such ward or whose, name has been wrongly included in the electoral roll of some other ward; or (ii) whose name is not so included in the State assembly rolls and who is otherwise qualified to be registered in the electoral roll of the ward; (e) the annual revision of the electoral rolls; (f) the custody and preservation of the electoral rolls; and (g) generally for all matters relating to the preparation and publication of the electoral rolls. In exercise of the powers under Section 22, the Collector of Ganganagar by order no. M/elec. , dated October 26, 1963 made certain provisions and published them in the Rajasthan Gazette Extraordinary, Pt. VI-- (K), dated 30-10-1963--Pages 314-318. The provisions material for the purpose of deciding Question No. 1 are stated below: "2 Publication of Draft Electoral Roll.--The Returning Officer shall publish the draft electoral rolls by making a copy thereof available for inspection, and displaying a notice in Form A.- (a) at the office of the Municipality concerned; (b) at two conspicuous places in a ward. The Returning Officer may also give further publicity to the notice in Form A as he may consider necessary. " X X x X X x (6 ). Final publication of Electoral Rolls.--The Returning Officer shall thereafter publish the roll together with the list of amendments by making a complete copy thereof available for inspection and displaying a notice in Form 'b' at the places where the rolls in draft were published under Clause 2. On such publication, the rolls together with the list of amendments shall be the final electoral rolls for the Municipal Board : provided that the Returning Officer, may at any lime correct any clerical or printing errors that he may discover in the electoral rolls. In substance, the sections relating to the preparation of electoral roll of a ward in a municipality provide that the electoral roll prepared for the state Assembly constituency relatable to the area comprised in a ward shall be the electoral roll for the ward and alteration, addition, omission and modification made in the Assembly constituency relatable to that ward shall be incorporated in it from time to time. Thus, it becomes necessary to refer to the provisions of law relating to the preparation of electoral roll for the State Assembly. The Parliament has enacted the representation of the People Act, 1950 (Act No 43 of 1950) which deals with the allocation of seats and delimitation of constituencies the qualifications of voters and preparation of electoral rolls and matters connected therewith. In the matter of the preparation of electoral rolls, section 21 of the Representation of the People Act, 1950 provides that the electoral rolls, shall be prepared in the prescribed manner by reference to the qualifying date The Central Government has made rules called. 'the Registration of Electors' Rules, 1960' Rules 10 and 11 are material in this case, and they run, as follows: "10. Publication of roll in draft--As soon as the roll for a constituency is ready, the registration officer shall publish it in draft by making a copy thereof available for inspection and displaying a notice in Form 5-- (a) at his office if it is within the constituency, and (b) at such place in the constituency as may be specified by him for the purpose, if his office is outside the constituency. 11. Further publicity to the roll and notice. The registration officer shall also-- (a) make a copy of each separate part of the roll together with a copy of the notice in Form 5 available for inspection at a specified place accessible to the public and in or near the area to which that part relates; (b) give such further publicity to the notice in Form 5 as he may consider necessary, and (c) supply free of cost two copies of each separate part of the roll to every political party for which a symbol has been exclusively reserved in the State by the Election Commission. "
(2.) THE first question referred to the Full Bench relates to the interpretation of clause 2 of the order of the Collector. This clause makes it necessary for the returning Officer to publish the draft electoral rolls, the term 'returning Officer' being used for the officer registering the names of the electors. The manner of publication is given in this clause. It consists in making the copies of the draft electoral roll available for inspection. The controversy is, whether the draft electoral rolls are to be made available for inspection at the places 'a' and 'b' mentioned in that clause, or only notices in Form 'a' are to be displayed at such places. The notice in Form 'a' is to mention that electoral roll of a particular ward is being made available for inspection at a particular place.
(3.) IN our opinion, mere displaying of notices in Form 'a' at the places referred to in the clause is not sufficient but the copies of the electoral rolls must be made available for inspection at the places. Our reason for adopting this view is that if the mere displaying of notices in Form 'a' at the aforesaid places is deemed to be sufficient, then it shall have to be taken that the rule has not specified the places where the copy of the electoral rolls is to be made available for inspection, and it is left to the sweet will of the Returning Officer to make them so available at any place, This could not have been the intention of the order. The proper view would be to hold that Clause 2 has made it incumbent on the Returning Officer to make available a copy of the electoral roll for inspection at each of these places and did not leave it to the Returning Officer to place them at any place which may be even outside the ward. The publication of the draft electoral roll is considered necessary so that mistakes, if any, in it may be pointed out by the residents of the ward and this purpose will be better fulfilled if the copy of the electoral roll is placed at some conspicuous place in the ward in addition to its being available at the office of the municipality concerned this interpretation is therefore more in consonance with the underlying intention of Clause 2 as it would help in achieving the object behind it in much more effective manner, and also be convenient to the residents of the ward concerned then again places (a) and (b) in this clause have been mentioned not in continuation of the expression 'displaying a notice in Form 'a', but after putting a dash after it. This shows that the places mentioned at (a) and (b) have reference to making a copy of the draft electoral roll available for inspection and also for displaying notice in Form 'a'. This interpretation is in consonance with the principle that- ". . . where a clause, or phrase, follows several words to which it might be equally applicable, it should, if at all possible, be considered as applying to them all. ' , (Statutory Construction (Interpretation of Laws) by craford, 1940 Edn. p 332)This interpretation is further borne out by reference to Rules 10 and 11 of the registration of Electoral Rules, 1960. The phraseology employed in Clause 2 of the collector's order is a compressed form of the aforesaid rules. Rule 10 makes provision for publication of the roll in draft by making it available for inspection and also for displaying a notice in Form 5. We are left in no manner of doubt about the interpretation of Rule 10 that it makes incumbent on the Registration Officer to make a copy of the roll available for inspection at his office if it is within the constituency and if his office is not within the constituency, at such places in the constituency as may be specified by him for the purpose. The same must be the interpretation of Para. 2 of Clause 2 which has been adopted from Rule 10 with some changes. ;