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Judgment
Sabyasachi Bhattacharyya, J
The Court : Affidavit of service filed in Court today be kept on record.
The petitioners appear in person and are granted leave to move the matter in person.
The grievance of the petitioners is that they are members of the Union Bank of India Officers' Association (West Bengal and Sikkim), being respondent no. 4 herein, and are entitled to participate in an election of the said Union, scheduled to be held at Siliguri on March 22, 2020. The petitioners have made out a prima facie case as regards intention of the respondent no 4 in holding such election at Siliguri being patently mala fide, since 374, out of the total 530 members of the said Union, reside and work at Kolkata. It would be impossible to leave office on a working day for so many members together to participate in the election. However, since March 21, 2020 as well as March 23, 2020 are both working days and the members working at Kolkata would find it extremely difficult to participate in such election, scheduled to be held at 3 p.m. on March 22, 2020 and rejoin their services the very next day, the petitioners submit that the date and time of the election was deliberately fixed as indicated above, so that the majority members of the respondent no. 4 Union, who work at Kolkata, would not be able to participate in the election. The petitioners rely on Annexure P3 at page 22, being the staff circular no. 6608 dated April 18, 2017, which restricted the officers-members from absenting themselves from that date, or to be late in attending office or leave the station without having obtained permission of the competent authority.
In such view of the matter, a strong prima facie case has been made out by the petitioners as to the fixation of dates and time for the general election being mala fide on the part of the respondent no. 4 authorities. The balance of convenience and inconvenience in favour of granting such injunction, since if the election is held and a newly elected body assumes power, the writ petition would be infructuous; on the other hand, in the event the writ petition fails, another date can be fixed for such election, if necessary upon imposition of compensatory costs being awarded against the petitioners.
Although there is a notification of this Court requesting Judges not to take up matters for hearing in the absence of all the parties, since sufficient notice has been given to the respondents and in view of the extreme urgency involved in the matter, the matter is taken up for hearing.
In the circumstances aforesaid, the respondent no. 4 is restrained by an order of injunction from holding the general election of the Union Bank of India Officers' Association (West Bengal and Sikkim) on Sunday March 22, 2020 at 3 p.m. as scheduled. However, this order shall be without prejudice to the rights and contention of the parties, which will finally be decided at the time of the disposal of the writ petition.
The petitioners are directed to communicate this order to the respondent no. 4 immediately and the respondent no. 4, if so communicated, shall act on the same without insisting upon a certified copy of the order.
The matter will appear next on April 20, 2020 at 3 p.m. for further hearing.