The Gujarat High Court directed the Registrar, Co-operative societies to file an affidavit answering the issue related to the provisions of the Gujarat Co-operative Societies Act, 1961.
The Division Bench of Chief Justice Sunita Agarwal and Justice Pranav Trivedi heard a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) filed pertaining to the implementation of the provisions of the Gujarat Co-operative Societies Act, 1961.
The first issue is pertaining to the implementation of Section 76 of the Act 1961, which empowers the State Government to provide for qualification, conditions of service, staff schedule, procedure of recruitment for appointment of Manager, Secretary, Accountant or any other officer of employee of all urban cooperative banks, federal societies and specified co-operative societies as referred in Section 74C excluding the societies of the cooperative credit structure.
It is brought on record before the Court that there are around 350 specified co-operative societies, 186 Urban Co-operative Societies including others, in total 81,468 Co-operative Societies are operating in the State of Gujarat as on 31.03.2020 wherein approximately 3,00,000 employees are working as on date.
The submission is that the requirement of Section 76 for providing the qualification etc., is to maintain the standards of the services in such co-operative societies. Till date, no notification has been issued by the State Government complying with the requirement of Section 76. The result is that different co-operative societies are engaging their staff in an indiscriminate manner, as per their wish and will, resulting in engagement of unqualified and incompetent staff and exercising the unfettered powers in the matter of regulating the conditions of service of such staff.
The second issue is with regard to the constitution of the State Co-operative Council as prescribed under Section 156 of the Act, 1961. The attention of the Court is invited to Sub-section (3) of Section 156 to impress upon that the functions of the State Co-operative Council is of significant importance in the matter of regulating the affairs of the Co-operative Societies registered under the Co-operative Societies Act, 1961. It is submitted that though the constitution of the State Co-operative Council has been notified around 10 to 12 years back, but there is no notification of the current constitution of the Council. The petitioner has also raised apprehension about the council, if exist, holding regular meetings to discharge its functions.
The last issue is with regard to the exercise of power under Section 156 A. It is submitted by the learned Senior Counsel appearing for the petitioners that though as per the information received by the petitioner, some executive instructions have been issued by the State Government in directing the societies to make purchase by filing an e-tender process, but there is no notification in the official gazette, which would bind all such co-operative societies.
Matter is listed on 30.08.2024 for further hearing.