High Court issues notice to Punjab on plea seeking quashing of move to dissolve gram panchayats

High Court issues notice to Punjab on plea seeking quashing of move to dissolve gram panchayats
Chandigarh: Less than a week after the Punjab government issued a notification to dissolve all gram panchayats in the state, the Punjab and Haryana High Court on Thursday issued a notice of motion to the state of Punjab on a petition seeking the quashing of the decision. Among other things, it was stated in the petition that the notification dated August 10 was “totally illegal, arbitrary and against the principle of natural justice”.

Taking up the petition filed by Balwinder Singh and other petitioners, the Division Bench of Justice Raj Mohan Singh and Justice Harpreet Singh Brar also fixed August 28 as the next date of hearing. The petitioners––elected representatives/sarpanches of gram panchayats––submitted through counsel Manish Kumar Singla, Shikha Singla and Dinesh Kumar that the notification was also against the settled law. Elaborating on it, they contended that all gram panchayats in the state of Punjab had wrongly and illegally been dissolved before the expiry of the tenure/term of the elected representatives.

It was added that the petitioners being elected sarpanches took charge only in January 2019. As such, their tenure was up to January 2024. But it was decided by the state government to hold elections to gram panchayats by December 31.

The petitioners said all gram panchayats were dissolved and Director, Rural Development and Panchayats–cum–Special Secretary, was authorised to appoint administrators to perform all the functions and exercise powers of the gram panchayat.

The counsel said the power to announce election any time and to dissolve the panchayats could not mean that the tenure laid down by the Constitution could be curtailed at the whim and fancy of the authority concerned. The Constitution guaranteed a five-year term, beginning from the date of the first meeting, this provision was sacrosanct, the counsel added.

“The elections to the gram panchayats can be announced at any time within six months preceding the date of the completion of the term. During this interval, if the authority finds that it is in public interest to do so, it can order the dissolution of the existing panchayat(s) and not otherwise, and here in the present case no public interest is there, rather the present dispensation wants to cash in on the prevailing mood,” the counsel added.

The petition added that one of the questions for adjudication before the Bench was whether the government could dissolve all the panchayats and announce elections before the expiry of the prescribed five-year period, “especially when even under Article 243E of the Constitution and Section 15 of the Punjab Panchayati Raj Act, 1994, it is mentioned that the term/tenure of every panchayat shall be for five years from the date appointed for its first meeting”.