Orissa HC voids no-confidence notice against Kendrapada Sarpanch over one missing day and unproven enclosures
Justice Sanjay Kumar Mishra harmonised two Full Bench rulings, held that the 15 clear days under Section 24(2)(c) of the Odisha Grama Panchayats Act run from the day the notice is posted, found a one-day shortfall in the notice to Tikhiri Sarpanch Chameli Ojha, rejected a 42-gram envelope as proof that the requisition and resolution were enclosed, and asked the State to amend the service provisions.
A no-confidence meeting that was to unseat the Sarpanch of Tikhiri Gram Panchayat in Kendrapada district has been set aside by the Orissa High Court because the notice convening it left the post office one day too late and the State could not prove what was inside the envelope. In a judgment of 28 October 2026, Justice Sanjay Kumar Mishra held that the fifteen clear days which Section 24(2)(c) of the Odisha Grama Panchayats Act, 1964 requires between notice and meeting are counted from the date the notice is actually dispatched by post, excluding both that day and the day of the meeting, and that a bulk-booking receipt showing a 42-gram envelope cannot establish that the requisition and the proposed resolution travelled with the notice. The notice of 27 July 2026 and everything done under it, including the meeting fixed for 13 August 2026, were set aside.
A notice served on her father while she was on flood relief
Chameli Ojha was elected Sarpanch of Tikhiri Gram Panchayat, under Mahakalpada Block, in 2022. Her petition said she belongs to the ruling party and won with a large majority, that she had been harassed by the local administration and party leaders for standing up for the people, and that the ward members had stood by her and accompanied her to the State capital in protest. The panchayat, by her account, has 21 wards; the State’s affidavit refers to 22 ward members.
According to the petition, she was away on flood relief work in the panchayat’s affected villages, in continuous touch with the Sub-Collector and the Block Development Officer, when a notice dated 27 July 2026 was served on her father at home on 31 July 2026 by officials she could not identify. Her father is illiterate and elderly; his thumb impression was taken on the notice alongside the signature of one Babita Behera. She learnt of it when she returned home on 3 August 2026. The notice said that copies of the requisition and the proposed resolution were annexed, but none were. She wrote to the Sub-Collector on 3 August 2026 pointing this out and asking for the copies; nobody at the office would receive the letter, so she sent it by Speed Post on 4 August. A second copy of the notice, sent by Speed Post from the Collectorate rather than the Sub-Collector, was received by her brother Suryakanta Ojha on 3 August 2026, again without enclosures. She wrote to the Collector on 6 August. Neither letter was answered.
The petition was listed for fresh admission on 10 August 2026, three days before the meeting, and was substantially heard that day because nine ward members, opposite parties 10, 18 to 22 and 24 to 26, had entered caveat and filed an affidavit sworn by the Ward 14 member. He said the notice with the requisition and resolution had reached him by Speed Post on 30 July 2026 and that other ward members had received theirs too. At the request of Advocate General Pitambar Acharya, who appeared with Additional Government Advocate P.K. Ray, the matter was adjourned to 11 August so that the Sub-Collector’s written instructions could be placed on affidavit.
The Sub-Collector’s affidavit did not answer the petition paragraph by paragraph. It said the notice with copies of the requisition and resolution was sent to all 22 ward members and the Sarpanch by Speed Post on 28 July 2026; that the bulk-booking receipt from the Department of Posts showed 27 articles booked to 27 persons, each envelope weighing 42 grams, so the petitioner’s claim that her brother received a bare notice was incorrect; that the notice with enclosures was also served on her father at her residence in the presence of villagers and the witness Babita Behera through the Gram Panchayat Development Officer; and that the fifteen-day period is directory, not mandatory, and in any event ran from 27 July to 13 August with fifteen clear days in between. Advocate Sukant Kumar Dalai, for the Sarpanch, asked to reply and sought interim protection; the court held that no reply was needed, heard the matter further, and reserved judgment.
Two Full Benches, two lines of Division Bench authority
The Advocate General built his case on paragraph 18 of the Full Bench decision in Sarat Padhi v. State of Orissa, AIR 1988 Ori 116. That judgment splits the notice scheme under Section 24(2)(c) into three parts: the requirement of giving notice, the margin of time between the date of the notice and the date of the meeting, and service on the members. The first two are mandatory; the third, including a member receiving the notice late or not at all, is directory, on the public-policy ground that a delinquent Sarpanch could otherwise defeat the motion by dodging service. Senior Advocate Prafulla Kumar Rath, for the nine ward members, added that the fifteen days run between the date of the notice and the date of the meeting, not from actual receipt, and that even excluding both dates there were fifteen clear days between 27 July and 13 August. He relied on Sarat Padhi, Nirakar Sethi v. State of Odisha, 2021 (III) ILR-CUT-612, Ajay Kumar Sahoo v. State of Odisha, 121 (2016) CLT 597, Sidhanta Dalai v. State of Odisha, MANU/OR/1519/2025, and Gunduri Singh v. State of Odisha, 2026 SCC OnLine Ori 3705.
Mr Dalai answered with the more recent Full Bench in Nabanita Kapat Patra v. Collector, Kandhamal, 2025 (III) ILR-CUT-1221, decided on 29 November 2025, which held that the notice must be accompanied by both the requisition and the proposed resolution and that the requirement is mandatory; with the Division Bench in Manamati Pujari v. State of Odisha, W.A. No. 1721 of 2025, decided on 3 February 2026, which rejected the weight of a posted envelope as proof of its contents; and with Gyana Ranjan Dash v. State of Odisha, W.A. No. 994 of 2026, decided on 28 July 2026. He pointed out that the State’s affidavit had not specifically denied the service on the illiterate father without enclosures, and had neither replied to the representations of 3 and 6 August nor supplied the copies.
Justice Mishra framed five points: whether fifteen clear days’ notice with the two enclosures is mandatory; how the fifteen days are to be calculated; whether there was a shortfall here and, if so, whether clause (e) of Section 24(2) saved the meeting; whether the State’s affidavit showed compliance with clauses (c) and (d); and whether the weight of the envelope could support an inference that the enclosures were sent.
Nabanita Kapat Patra governs the enclosures; Sarat Padhi governs service
The judge first dealt with the apparent conflict between the two Full Benches. Sarat Padhi, decided on a notice received only twelve days before a 1985 meeting, had held that breach of the duty to give notice or of the fifteen-day margin invalidates the meeting without proof of prejudice, while short service or non-receipt does not. Nabanita Kapat Patra arose because two Division Benches had differed on whether the requisition and the proposed resolution had to accompany the notice; the notice there carried the requisition but not the resolution, and the Full Bench held that clauses (a) to (d) of Section 24(2) use the word shall, that there is no room to read it as may given that a successful motion removes a directly elected Sarpanch from office and membership altogether, and that the removal procedure is a species of election law which is what the statute says it is.
Sarat Padhi was not cited before the later Full Bench, and the later judgment contains no declaration that the earlier one is wrong or overruled; its discussion of conflicting precedent is directed at two Division Bench rulings. Read in isolation, the judge accepted, some observations in Nabanita Kapat Patra could be invoked to argue that every element of clause (c), including the period available to a member after issue, is mandatory. But the actual question decided was whether omission of the proposed resolution vitiated the notice; the Full Bench never decided whether a member who receives the notice less than fifteen clear days before the meeting can have it invalidated without proof of prejudice. The two decisions could therefore be harmonised: where the defect is the absence of the requisition or the resolution, Nabanita Kapat Patra governs; where the defect is merely short service or non-receipt, Sarat Padhi remains the directly applicable authority. On the first point, the judge held that giving fifteen clear days’ notice along with copies of the proposed resolution and requisition is mandatory, while the mode of service and receipt are directory, so that non-receipt or a shortfall counted from receipt does not annul the motion if the notice was given in time.
The clock starts at dispatch, and 29 July to 13 August gives only fourteen days
How the fifteen days are counted had been addressed in two Division Bench decisions that followed Sarat Padhi. In Heeramani Munda v. Collector, Keonjhar, 2004 SCC OnLine Ori 86, a notice of 15 July 2004 for a meeting on 30 July 2004 was held to give only thirteen days once the date of notice and the date of meeting were excluded, and the motion was quashed. In Nilambar Majhi v. Secretary, Panchayat Raj Department, 2005 SCC OnLine Ori 247, the Sub-Collector had signed the notice on 13 May 2005 but it was dispatched only on 16 May for a meeting on 30 May; the Division Bench held that the term give notice in clause (c) means issue of notice, that signing is not issue, that the date of signing and the date of receipt are both irrelevant, and that excluding 16 and 30 May left less than fifteen days. That court also held that a Sarpanch who attends the meeting is not estopped from challenging it on this ground.
The judge then turned to the authorities the ward members relied on. Nirakar Sethi had treated a thirteen-day gap between receipt and meeting as a directory matter, but Heeramani Munda and Nilambar Majhi were not brought to that bench’s notice. Ajay Kumar Sahoo, far from helping the ward members, reaffirmed that the fifteen clear days must exist after excluding the date of notice and the date of meeting. In Sidhanta Dalai the notice was dated 16 November 2024, dispatched on 20 November and the meeting fixed for 6 December 2024, so there were fifteen clear days from dispatch in any event. Only Nilambar Majhi had squarely addressed which date counts as the date of notice, and it answered that it is the date of actual dispatch under certificate of posting or Speed Post. Justice Mishra adopted that rule: there must be fifteen clear days between the date on which the notice is dispatched by post and the date fixed for the meeting, with both dates excluded, and this requirement is mandatory.
On the record, the notice dated 27 July 2026 was dispatched by Speed Post on 29 July 2026, the date shown on the bulk-booking receipts. Excluding 29 July and 13 August leaves fourteen days. That is a shortfall. The State and the ward members had argued that clause (e), under which proceedings are not invalidated merely because a member did not receive the notice, cured any shortfall. The judge rejected that, citing paragraph 4.7(ii) of Nabanita Kapat Patra, which holds that non-receipt of notice by a member is one thing and the giving of notice another: once notice has been given and received, its validity is judged against clauses (a) to (d), and the case never reaches clause (e). A shortfall in the mandatory period, the judge held, cannot be equated with non-receipt. The third point was answered for the Sarpanch.
A 42-gram envelope proves nothing about what was inside it
The fourth and fifth points were taken together. The Sarpanch’s representation of 3 August carried her endorsement that nobody at the Sub-Collector’s office would accept it, forcing her to post it the next day; the Sub-Collector’s affidavit did not deny this, and did not say whether or when the office had responded. The envelope her brother received bore the Sub-Collector’s seal as sender, scored out and re-sealed with the Collectorate despatcher as sender. Her further representation of 6 August to the Collector, asking again for the copies, went equally unanswered; neither the affidavit nor its annexures mention the status of either letter.
Against that silence, the State offered only the bulk-booking receipt and the uniform 42-gram weight of the 27 envelopes. The judge held that the Division Bench in Manamati Pujari had turned down exactly this argument. There the original records showed a certificate of posting proving that a notice had reached the appellant, but nothing to show that the envelope had contained the requisition and the proposed resolution; drawing on A.B. Majumder’s treatise on notices and Harihar Banerji v. Ramshashi Roy, AIR 1918 PC 102, the bench said that on the basis of the weight of an envelope “one cannot hurriedly jump to the assumption” that it held all three documents, and gave little credence to a letter asserting service that had been generated after litigation began. With no specific denial of the Sarpanch’s allegations and that authority in the field, Justice Mishra held that the envelope’s weight could not support the inference that the enclosures were sent. Both points went to the petitioner.
The conclusion followed. The Sub-Collector had failed to establish compliance with the mandatory requirement in Section 24(2)(c). The material fell short of showing that the notice of 27 July 2026 was served on the Sarpanch together with the requisition and the proposed resolution, and there was in any case a shortfall in the fifteen clear days. The notice was vitiated.
A request to the legislature: certificate of posting no longer exists
Before parting, the judge recorded that almost every writ petition by a Sarpanch or Naib-Sarpanch against a no-confidence motion now turns on the same two procedural complaints, non-supply of the enclosures and want of fifteen clear days, and that a Sarpanch facing a motion may “tactfully avoid to receive the notice” and deny the enclosures even when they were sent, taking advantage of Manamati Pujari. Clause (d) still prescribes dispatch under certificate of posting, a postal facility stated to have been discontinued, which creates uncertainty about how dispatch and contents can be proved at all; a further difficulty arises where receipt of the notice is established but delivery of the enclosures is disputed.
The judgment asks the State Government to examine, and if necessary initiate legislation to amend, clauses (c) and (d) of Section 24(2) so as to prescribe an available and reliable mode of service, the manner of serving and evidencing delivery of the notice and its enclosures, and the relationship between dispatch, actual delivery and the fifteen clear days. It suggests an official record or certificate identifying the documents served, the date and mode of service and its result, with an alternative procedure where service cannot be effected despite reasonable efforts, and insists that any amendment preserve the time safeguards and the right of the office-bearer and members to know the substance of the motion in advance. The judge made clear that these observations invite legislative consideration only; they neither substitute a different mode of service for the one the Act prescribes nor dilute the requirements applied in this case.
Order
The writ petition, W.P.(C) No. 25251 of 2026, was allowed. The notice dated 27 July 2026 issued by the Sub-Collector, Kendrapada under Section 24(2)(c) of the Odisha Grama Panchayats Act, 1964, and all consequential action taken under it, including the special meeting fixed for 13 August 2026 at the Tikhiri Gram Panchayat office, were set aside. There was no order as to costs. The judgment was reserved after hearing on 11 August 2026 and delivered on 28 October 2026.