All India Council An... v. Assistant Registrar,...

A.N Varma, J.:— This petition is directed against the order dated 23-12-87 passed by the Asstt. Registrar. Firms Societies and Chits. Varanasi purporting to determine a dispute relating to the election or continuance in office of certain office-bearers of a Society called Bharat Dharm Mahamandal. The petitioners contend that the impugned order is completely void as the Assistant Registrar had no jurisdiction to decide the dispute himself in view of S. 25 of the Societies Registration Act as amended by the State Legislature. The order is also assailed on merits but we do not propose to comment on the same in view of the fact that we are upholding the objection of the petitioners as regards the jurisdiction or more appropriately the lack of it of the Assistant Registrar.

2. Bharat Dharm Mahamandal is a Society registered under the Societies Registration Act, 1860. The society has been established for the purpose of promoting Hindu Religious Education in accordance with the Sanatan Dharma. The object disclosed in the memorandum of Association is to defuse the knowledge of Vedas. Puranas and other Hindu Shastras. The management of the Society and the control of its affairs are exercised by All India Pratinidhi Sabha(‘Pratinidhi Sabha’ for short) which is the General Body of the Society. The office-bearers of the Pratinidhi Sabha are (i) President, (ii) Vice President: (iii) Chief Secretary; (iv) Joint Chief Secretary. On 25-10-86 the office-bearers of the Pratinidhi Sabha were elected for a term of three years. Sri Shiv Nandan Lal Dar was elected as the Chief Secretary and Sri Param Hans Misra as the Joint Chief Secretary. On 15-2-87 Sri Shiv Nandan Lal Dar submitted his resignation at a meeting of the Pratinidhi Sabha which was accepted and Sri Siya Ram Misre was asked to perform the function and duties of the Chief Secretary for the remaining term. The proceedings of the meeting of the Pratinidhi Sabha held on 15-2-87 are stated to have been revoked at a meeting held on 24-8-87 and at another meeting held on 13-9-87 Sri Dar was persuaded to withdraw his resignation and to continue on the post of the Chief Secretary as before. Sri Param Hans Misra the Chief Secretary, on the other hand, seems to have held a parallel meeting on 3-7-87 at which the resignation of Sri Dar was accepted and in his place he was himself alleged to have been elected as the Chief Secretary. A further decision to remove Sri Brij Mohan Dixit, the President of All India Council, the executive of the Society is also claimed to have taken at the same meeting. These two parellel meetings and the decisions taken thereat regarding the continuance of Sri Shiv Nandan Lal Dar as the Chief Secretary and the alleged election of Sri Param Hans Misra at the meeting of the 3rd July, 1987 convened by him as the Chief Secretary led to disputes and differences between the parties. Both the groups, one represented by the petitioner and the other by Param Hans Misra the respondent 2 seem to have addressed letters to the Assistant Registrar each seeking legitimacy of the action taken by it and both disputing the claim of the other as regards the office of the Chief Secretary of the Pratinidhi Sabha. Upon these letters the impugned order has been passed.

3. By the impugned order, the Assistant Registrar has disposed of two matters, one pertaining to certain amendments of the bye-laws of the Society which he has disapproved on the ground that the same travelled beyond the objects of the Society and the other relating to the question whether Sri Dar had a right to continue as the Chief Secretary after the submission of his resignation and whether Sri Param Hans Misra was validly elected as the Chief Secretary of the Pratinidhi Sabha. The Assistant Registrar has held that the resignation of Sri Dar did not require acceptance and consequently he ceased to be the Chief Secretary after his resignation on 15-2-87. As regards Sri Param Hans Misra the finding is that as the Deputy Chief Secretary he had a right to perform functions of the Chief Secretary for the remaining term. He has also upheld the election of Shri Param Hans Misra as the Chief Secretary at the meeting convened by Sri Misra for 3-7-87.

4. The contention of the learned counsel for the petitioner is that the Assistant Registrar had no jurisdiction to decide the dispute with regard to continuance of Sri Dar as the Chief Secretary and that he was bound to refer the dispute under S. 25 of the Societies Registration Act to the Prescribed Authority.

5. The petitioners are clearly right. S. 25 of the Societies Registration Act as amended by the State Legislature enacts a comprehensive code and creates a designated forum or tribunal for adjudication in a summary manner of all disputes or doubts in respect of the election or continuance in office of an office-bearer of such society. It also provides the grounds upon which the election of an office-bearer can be set aside. The procedure to be followed for filling up of the vacancies arising from the decisions rendered by the Prescribed Authority under sub-sec. (i) of S. 25 has also been laid down (S. 25(2).)

6. It will, therefore, be seen that insofar as disputes or doubts in respect of the election or continuance in office of the office-bearers of a society registered in Uttar Pradesh are concerned, the Legislature has created a specific forum and laid down an exhaustive procedure for determination of the same under S. 25. There is no other provision, express or otherwise, providing for determination of such disputes specifically. It is settled law that where, as here, the Legislature creates a specific forum and lays an exhaustive procedure for determination of a particular class of disputes in respect of matters covered by the statute, such disputes can be determined only in that forum and in the manner prescribed thereunder and not otherwise. If therefore, a dispute is raised with regard to the election or continuance in office of an office-bearer of a society registered in Uttar Pradesh, the same has to be decided only by the Prescribed Authority under S. 25(1) and not by the Registrar, save of course, to the decision of the Prescribed Authority being subject to the result of a civil suit.

7. Reverting to the facts of the present case, without doubt a dispute had clearly arisen with regard to the election of Sri Param Hans Misra as the Chief Secretary on July 3, 1987 as well as the continuance in the office of Sri Shyam Nandan Lal Dar as the Chief Secretary. The dispute indubitably fell within the four corners of the class of disputes or doubts referred to in S. 25(1). Such a dispute could not therefore, be decided by the Assistant Registrar.

8. We are fortified on this point by a long line of decisions of this Court in which the view taken is that if such a dispute-is raised before or is brought to the notice of the Registrar, he should refer the same for adjudication to the Prescribed Authority and that he cannot claim to decide that dispute himself. We will content ourselves with citing just two decisions (See 1981 LPLBFC 308. Vijai Narain Singh v. Registrar, Chit Funds, Firms and Societies, U.P and 1984 UPI RFC 550 : (1984 All LJ 583). Maha Narain Pando v. Registrar, Chit Funds, Firms and Societies. U.P These two decisions have also been recently followed by a decision of this court in Writ Petn. No. 14879 of 1986 decided mi December 11, 1986.

9. Learned counsel for the contesting respondents, however, sought to justify the order under the proviso to S. 4(i) of the Societies Registration Act which reads as follows:—

“4. Annual list of Managing body to be filed—

(i) Once in every year, on or before the fourteenth day succeeding the day on which according to the rules of the society, the annual general meeting of the society is held or if the rules do not provide for an annual general meeting, in the month of January, a list shall be filed with the (Registrar) of the names, addresses and occupations of the governors, council, directors, committee, or other governing body then entrusted with management of the affairs of the society:

Provided that if the managing body is elected after the last submission of the list the counter signatures of the old members shall as far as possible, be obtained on the list, if the old office-bearers do not countersign the list, the Registrar may in his discretion, issue a public notice or notice to such persons as he thinks fit inviting objection within a specified period and shall decide all objections received within the said period.”

10. It was urged that the Registrar derives jurisdiction under this provision to determine the dispute. We are unable to agree. In the first place, the dispute has not arisen in the context of the submission of the annual list of the managing body which is required to be filed under S. 4(1). Secondly the power of the Registrar to decide objections filed under the proviso to S. 4(1) must be held to operate in a field not covered by S. 25 of the Act. Under the proviso to S. 4(1) the Registrar deals only such matters as may arise in the context of the submission of the annual list of the managing body Further in the present case we are concerned here not with the election of the managing body but with the election of the office-bearers of the Society. The managing body here is the All India Council which is different from the Pratinidhi Sabha. In any case, insofar as as the disputes relating to the election of the office-bearers of a society registered in Uttar Pradesh is concerned, the same has to be decided only in the manner prescribed under S. 25(1) on the principle that the ‘special excludes the general’. This is the only way in which the proviso to S. 4 can be harmonised with S. 25. Consequently if a dispute of the nature covered by S. 25 is raised before the Registrar in connection with the submission of the annual list under S. 4(1) of the Act the same must, in view of the Legislative mandate embodied in S. 25(1), be referred by him to the Proscribed Authority he Bench deciding writ petn. No. 14879 of 1986 referred to above was also of the opinion that the proviso to S. 4(1) does not have the effect of whittling down the scope of S. 25(1).

11. Counsel for the respondents also urged that some of the parties had invited the Assistant Registrar to refer the dispute to the Prescribed Authority. Consequently the Assistant Registrar had no option but to decide the dispute himself under S. 4.

12. The contention is wholly devoid of any substance. No express invitation in writing is needed under S. 25 for the Registrar to refer the dispute to the Prescribed Authority because under S. 25 the Registrar is bound to refer the dispute once the same is brought to his notice. At any rate, S. 25 bars the Registrar to decide the dispute himself.

13. In the premise, the petition succeeds and is allowed. The impugned order dated 23-12-87 passed by the Assistant Registrar is quashed. It will, however, be open to him to refer the dispute for adjudication by the Prescribed Authority under S. 25(1) of the Societies Registration Act.

14. Petition allowed.