The Bombay High Court dismissed the writ petition challenging the letter/communication dated 24.12.2020 by which membership of 1392 newly added members was held legal and valid. A single judge bench of this Court comprising Hon’ble Justice Arun R. Pendekar held that the only remedy of challenging the issue of eligibility of the membership and validity of the resolution adopted is before the Cooperative Court under section 91 of the Maharashtra Cooperative Societies Act, 1960 (“MCS”).
Brief Facts:
Previously, the case of the Petitioner was that respondent No. 5/Bank illegally inducted 1405 members without following due procedure on 26.7.2019 as they were favorable to the elected body. After that, the petitioners approached the High Court by filing Writ Petition, which was disposed of due to the statement made before the High Court that the complaints/representations filed by petitioners would be considered and decided within three months. During the inquiry, it came out that documentation of only 13 newly inducted members was not proper or complete, and as such, respondent No. 5/Bank took action against 13 members and informed the same to respondent No. 2. respondent No. 2, on perusal of the record, by communication dated 24.12.2020 declared that membership of 1392 is legal and valid and that membership of only 13 members was invalid.
In this petition, the petitioners prayed for quashing the letter/communication dated 24.12.2020 issued by the Commissioner, Cooperative and Registrar Cooperative, Societies, Maharashtra State, thereby declaring that membership of 1392 newly added members is legal and valid out of 1405 newly added members.
Contentions of the Respondents:
The learned Counsel for the Respondents submitted that without challenging the membership and setting aside the resolution passed by the respondent No. 5/Cooperative Bank, there can be no proceedings under section 79A of the MCS Act, and the only option available to the petitioners is to challenge the resolution adopting membership of aforesaid members under section 91 of the MCS Act, if they are aggrieved by the same.
Observations of the Court:
This Court, after referring to the relevant provisions of the MCS Act i.e. sections 23 and 79A, observed that if membership is granted to any person is in contravention of MCS Act and is thus disputed, then the same can be remedied only by filing a dispute under section 91 of MCS Act by giving proper notice to the aggrieved person, and the same has to be done by adopting appropriate proceedings before the Cooperative Court. Merely because respondent No. 3, in its report, submitted that 144 members did not sign the membership form or did not comply with the KYC norms will alone not be sufficient to revert their membership, and in any event, the respondent No. 2 had verified the entire record and held that the membership of 1392 members is legal and valid.
Therefore, in view of this Court, if the petitioners are aggrieved by the resolution of the society inducting the newly added members, they are free to pursue the remedy before the competent cooperative Court under section 91 of the MCS Act, and the proceedings under section 79A are held misconceived.
The decision of the Court:
The Bombay High Court dismissed the writ petition in the absence of any public interest direction under section 79A of the MCS Act in contravention of section 23 of the MCS Act.
Case Title: Sudam s/o. Ganpat Kothambire and Ors. v. State of Maharashtra and Ors.
Coram: Hon’ble Justice Arun R. Pendekar
Case no.: WRIT PETITION NO. 5760 OF 2022
Advocate for the Petitioner: Mr. Ajinkya S. Kale
Advocate for the Respondents: Mr. N.T. Bagat and Mr. Mr. V.D. Hon
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