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TMI Blog1989 (3) TMI 380X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... oration. Respondents Nos. 1 and 2 are persons claiming to have been elected as Mayor and Deputy Mayor of the Corporation at a meeting held on June 1, 1988, the validity of which is disputed before The Corporation came into existence in 1982. The ele ctions to the Corporation were duly held in 1985 and 51 members were elected. On June 30, 1987, appellants Nos. 1 and 2 were duly elected as Mayor and Deputy Mayor respectively of the Corporation for a period of one year. On May 21, 1988, a notice was issued by appellants Nos. 1 and 2 to convene a meeting of the members of the Corporation at 5. 00 p.m. on June 1, 1988 to elect a Mayor and Deputy Mayor of the Corporation for the second term and for certain other business mentioned in the Agenda circulated. On May 3 1, 1988, appellant No. 1 gave instructions by a letter to t he Deputy Secretary of the Corporation to postpone the meeting of the Corporation as appellant No. 1 had to go to Gandhi nagar for a certain urgent work of the Corporation. It see ms clear from the record that the said instructions were given by appellant No. 1 after consulting 32 members of the Corp o- ration, presumably those belonging to his own party. Pursuant to ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... e Corporation had been deprived of the opportunity of exercising their right to elect a Mayor and Deputy Mayor by reason of the notice for postponing the meeting. A Letters Patent Appeal was preferred by respondents Nos. 1 and 2 against the decision of the learned Single Judge to a Division Bench of the Gujarat High Court. The Division Ben ch of the said High Court took the view that it was bound by the view taken by a Division Bench of this Court in Chandra kant Khaire v. Dr. Shantaram Kale and others, [1988] 4 S CC 577; AIR (1988) S.C 1665 where it was observed as follows: A properly convened meeting cannot be postponed. The prop er course to adopt is to hold the meeting as originally intend- ed and then and there adjourn it to a more suitable date. If this course be not adopted, members will be entitled to ignore the notice of postponement, and, if sufficient to form a quorum, hold the meeting as originally convened and validly transact the business thereat. The Division Bench pointed out that the number of members present at the said meeting on June 1, 1988 was sufficient to constitute the quorum prescribed and hence, the meeting must be held to be valid and responde ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... yor. (2) The Mayor and the Deputy Mayor shall hold office until a new Mayor and a new Deputy Mayor have be en elected under sub-section (1) and, in a year in which general elections have been held, shall do so notwithstanding that they have not been returned as councillors on t he results of the elections X X X X X Chapter XXIX of the said Act which deals with the subjects of rules, by-laws, regulations and standing orders. Section 453 in t he said Chapter provides that the rules as amended from time to time shall be deemed to be part of the said Act. Chapter II of the Schedule (under section 453) of t he said Act deals with the proceedings of the Corporation, Transport Committee, Standing Committee, etc. Sub-claus es (a) to (c) of Clause 1 of the said Chapter are as follows: 1. Provisions regulating Corporation proceedings. (a) There shall be in each month at least one ordinary meeting of the Corporation which shall be held not later than the twentieth day of the month; (b) the first meeting of the Corporation aft er general elections shall be held as early as conveniently may be on a day and at a time and place to be fixed by t he Commissioner, and if not held ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... should be continued. There was total confusion inside the hall. T he Municipal Commissioner informed the Collector, who w as present in the hall, that he could not hold the meeting in the unruly and disorderly situation prevailing and co m- plained that his repeated requests to the councillors to maintain peace, had no effect and they kept on shouting, raising slogans and fighting amongst themselves. The Commissioner announced that the polling for the offices of Mayo r, Deputy Mayor and Members of the .Standing Committee would commence from 2.30 p.m. onwards. Some members belonging to Shiv Sena Party sat on the ballot boxes and others belonging to that party and its supporters surrounded the Municip al Commissioner demanding the meeting be adjourned to a subsequent date. Thereupon, the councillors belonging to a Party-in-Power, namely, Congress (I), started shouting at him that the meeting should be held later on that day. Th is was followed by shouting of slogans, hurling of abuses and thumping of tables and even throwing of chairs. It appears that the Superintendent of Police and the Collector ask ed the outsiders to clear out of the hall and requested t he councillors to take t ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... , submitted by respondent No. 1, who appeared in person, that the decision in Chandrakant Khaire s case is directly applicable to the case before us and in view of t he same, it must be held that the Mayor, namely, appellant N o. 1, had no power to cancel the notice convening the meeting and hence it must be held that the meeting at which t he supporters of respondent No. 1 which met and elected respondent No. 1 as aforesaid was validly held and the resolution appointing respondent No. 1 was validly passed. As we have pointed out earlier in Chandrakant Khaire s case, the meeting which was convened had already commenced and the contention of the appellant was that in view of the riotous behaviour of the councillors as well as the outsiders who h ad got into the meeting, the Commissioner had adjourned t he meeting sine die. It was common ground that no resolution was passed at the meeting regarding its adjournment. It w as in those circumstances that the aforesaid observations have been made by the Division Bench of this Court which decided the case. The Bench in that case was not really concern ed with a situation where a meeting had not commenced at a ll and the notice convening t ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... meeting in the press f or the same day as previously arranged. On that day, he with certain other shareholders attended the meeting and at that meeting resolutions were approved re-electing himself as a director and refusing to re-appoint the other director. It was held that the resolutions were valid, for, in the absence of express authority in the articles, the directors of a company have no power to postpone a general meeting properly convened. It appears, therefore, that these observations are based on a decision which dealt with the powers of the directors of a company which are derived from the articles of association of the company which essentially are in the nature of a compact or an agreement. The only powers which the directors of a company have, are such as have be en conferred upon them by articles of association of the company. The powers of the Mayor of the Corporation, on the other hand, are statutory in nature and they are derived from t he Bombay Municipal Corporation Act. As set out by us earlier, sub-section (1) of Section 19 of the said Act provides f or the election of a Mayor of a Municipal Corporation. T he Mayor has various powers conferred under the said ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... that the Election Commissioner had power to postpone the poll was not applicable because it dealt only with the question of extending ti me for completion of the election and not for altering the date of the poll; Sections 57 and 58 of the Representation of t he People Act, 1951 could not be invoked by the Election Co m- missioner for this purpose. It was, however, held that section 30 of the Representation of the People Act read with Section 21 of General Clauses Act gives necessary powers to the Election Commissioner to alter the date of the poll. We may point out that we do not propose to set out the provisions of Section 30 of the Representation of the People A ct because it is not necessary to do so. Suffice it to note that the said section provides that the Election Commissio ner shall by notification in the official gazette appoint interalia the date or dates on which a poll shall, if necessary, be taken and also the date before which t he election shall be completed. Section 153 confers upon t he Election Commissioner the power to extend the time for t he completion of election. Section 21 of the Central General Clauses Act is in parimartia with Section 21 of the Bombay Gen ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... a meeting of the municipality had been vested by section 51(1) of the Gujarat Municipalities Act, 1963 must also be conferred the power to adjourn the meeting if, because of certain extraordinary circumstances like civil commotion or act of God or any other unusual event, it becomes necessary to adjourn t he holding of the meeting. The learned Judges constituting t he Division Bench held that they were unable to agree with t he view of the learned Single Judge to the effect that t he doctrine that he who has such power to convene a meeting h as also the power to adjourn the meeting, if the circumstances so demand, cannot be read into the provisions of the Gujarat Municipalites Act. The learned Judges, however, agreed with the learned Single Judge that the President of the Municipality had no power to adjourn the meeting at his !will or caprice. They also pointed out that unless unusual circumstances beyond the control of the President of the Municipality prevail, he cannot utilise this power to adjourn a meeting which has once been notified. Taking into account all the facts and circumstances of the case, it was held that the adjournment of the meeting of the municipality by the Pr ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... e of t he view that the Division Bench was not really called upon to consider the situation in such a case, as we have point ed out earlier. Moreover, it appears that the Division Ben ch has not taken into account the provisions of section 21 of the Bombay General Clauses Act or the principles underlying that section. No argument was advanced before the Division Bench on the basis of that section at all. The attention of the Division Bench was not drawn to the judgment of this Court in Mohd. Yunus Saleem s case. Had that been done, we feel that the Division Bench which decided t he Chandrakant Khaire s case, might not have made the aforestated observations at all. In our view, the principles underlying section 21 of the Bombay General Clauses A ct would be clearly applicable in considering the scope of t he powers of the Mayor of a Municipal Corporation set out in Clause 1 of Chapter II of the said Schedule in the said A ct and in particular, in sub-clause (c) of the said clause. We may point out that the rules in the Schedule have be en framed under the statutory provisions of the said Act a nd section 453 of the said Act provides that the rules in t he schedule as amended from ti ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X
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