Punjab and Haryana High Court: A Single Judge Bench comprising of Shekhar Dhawan, J., addressed a writ petition in nature of certiorari for quashing of a notification for creation of new Panchayats.
Facts of the case are that the Punjab Government issued a letter seeking application for forming of new Gram Panchayats/Gram Sabha. The petitioner had submitted that respondent passed a resolution for the same without following the provisions of Punjab Panchayat Raj Act, 1994 i.e. Sections 23 and 24. They had applied to form new Gram Panchayat without the consent of 1/3rd population of the village and panchas of newly proposed Gram Panchayat. The petitioner pointed out that under Section 24 of the Act quorum was not complete. There were 10 members in the existing Gram Panchayat and only 4 members were present when the resolution was passed.
High Court observed that quorum was not in accordance with Section 24 of the Act at the time of passing of the resolution. In addition to that resolution was already set aside by competent authority. On perusing the facts of the case Court noticed that the impugned notification could not have been issued after the resolution was set aside. Therefore, impugned notification was quashed. [Labh Singh v. State of Punjab,2018 SCC OnLine P&H 1222, decided on 23-08-2018]
