BGPM ready to form the Darjeeling Municipality Board - Court dismissed the appeal finding it devoid of merit

KalimNews, Kalimpong, 11 January 2023: The case of Darjeeling Municipality related to its floor test challenging the Board formed by Hamro Party bearing case no. M.A.T. 1 of 2023 with C.A.N. 1 of 2023 in the Court No.1 was heard on 11 January at Darjeeling Circuit bench for the final order. 

The applicants were Ritesh Portel and others and its appellant lawyers were Kunaljit Bhattacharya, Alok Sah, and Aishwary Pradhan. The respondents were Anmole Prasad, Amar Lama and Sagar Chettri and Subir Kumar Saha, AGP, Bikramaditya Ghosh for the state. 

The appellants challenged the order dated 26th December, 2022 passed by a Learned Single Judge of the first Court. By the said order, the writ petition, filed by the appellants was dismissed on the ground of being devoid of merit by the judge.Kaushik Chanda.

The division court headed by Moushumi Bhattacharya and Siddhartha Roy Chowdhury heard the learned counsel appearing for the appellants, the District Magistrate and the S.D.O. being the conducting authorities and the private respondents being the private respondent nos.6 to 21 namely the councillors of the Darjeeling Municipality in relation to the impugned judgment of the First Court. The matter was listed today on 11th January, 2023.

The appellants before us are the Chairman and the Vice-Chairman of the Darjeeling Municipality. 

The appellants are aggrieved by an order passed by the First Court dated 26.12.2022 in a writ petition filed by the appellants. 

The writ petition of the appellants was dismissed by the impugned order on the ground that the writ petition was devoid of merit. 

The writ petition was filed by the appellants for a direction on the respondents in the writ petition for restraining a meeting convened on 28.12.2022 for removal of the Chairman 

According to the appellants, the Resolution dated 28.12.2022 taken by the Councillors of the Darjeeling Municipality is contrary to the provisions of The West Bengal Municipal Act, 1993 read with The West Bengal Municipalities (Procedure and Conduct of Business) Rules, 1995. Counsel submits that the learned Single Judge misconstrued the provisions in the Act and the Rules and erred in dismissing the writ petition. We are hence of the considered view that order of the First Court is correct and that no other view is possible from a conjoint reading of section 18(3) of the 1993 Act and Rule 9(3)(b) of the 1995 Rules. 14. 

In any event, the Chairman of the Darjeeling Municipality has already been removed on 28.12.2022 and the appellants have not made out any case for 7 directing the Councillors to turn the clock back for restoring the position as of 27.12.2022 when the appellant no. 1 held Office as the Chairman. 

The order states that we accordingly hold that no grounds have been made out for interference with the impugned order of the First Court are accordingly dismissed without any order as to costs.