The Bombay High Court has affirmed a ruling that individuals with more than two children are ineligible to be members of the managing committee of housing societies. This decision was upheld in the case of a man who was declared disqualified by the departmental Joint Registrar based on his having three children. The issue pertains to a resident of Ekta Nagar Co-operative Housing in Charkop (Kandivali), who was elected to the committee last year.
A complaint was lodged against him by two society members to the Deputy Registrar of the Western Suburbs, due to his three children. After his appeal to the Joint Registrar did not succeed, he took the matter to the High Court.
The petitioner argued that the section of the Maharashtra Co-operative Society Act (MCS Act) under which he was declared ineligible was exempt from the Act. He claimed that the third child was not his biological child but was brought into his home for educational purposes.
The lawyer representing the complainant, Advocate Uday Warunjekar, stated that the Registrar’s order was within legal bounds and contained no flaws. He argued that the decision to declare the committee member ineligible was correct and should not be interfered with.
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Justice Avinash Gharote, after hearing the case, acknowledged that the small family norm related rule introduced by the 2019 amendment to the MCS Act 1960 is applicable here. Section 154-B of the Act clearly states that having more than two children automatically renders a person ineligible. The judge found no faults in the Registrar’s order and noted that the person in question failed to produce a birth certificate for the third child.
