NARAYANA PAI, C. J. ( 1 ) WHEN this Writ Petition was taken up for admission this morning, mr. S. V. Subramaniam who was in Court in connection with other work, took notice at our request on behalf of the 1st respondent-Returning officer, Corporation of Bangalore. The 2nd respondent is the State of mysore. For purpose of disposing of this Writ Petition, the presence of the state or anybody on its behalf is not necessary. Therefore notice to the 2nd respondent was dispensed with. ( 2 ) WE have now heard arguments on behalf of both the petitioner and the 1st respondent and proceed to make final order in this Writ Petition. ( 3 ) THE principal grievance of the petitioner, who has been appointed as the Presiding Officer at Polling Station No. 18 of Division No. 1, is that by reason of such appointment and in the absence of appropriate instructions issued by the Returning Officer, he is prevented from casting his vote as one of the voters entitled to do so. It would appear that at a meeting of the Returning Officer and the Presiding Officers convened for discussing the preliminaries, various suggestions were made as to the manner in which Presiding Officers may be enabled to cast their votes, but that the discussion did not result in the formulation of any workable plan Insisting that the right to vote is statutorily conferred upon him under S. 50 of the Act and the Returning Officer is bound by law to make it possible for him to vote and that any attempt on his part to prevent him from voting will defeat the purpose of the law. the petitioner pravs for issue of direction in the nature of mandamus calling upon the Returning Officer to make appropriate arrangements to enable the petitioner to exercise his vote in connection with elections to the Corporation ( 4 ) IN the course of the arguments before us, reference was made, among other things, to the provisions governing the conduct of General elections under the Representation of the People Act and attempts were made to see whether the procedure of permitting Presiding Officers to resort to postal voting may not be adopted in this case also The question, however, debated at the instance of or in the course of the answers to the arguments by Mr. Subramaniam, was that it may not be possible to fit such a procedure into the scheme under the City of Bangalore Municipal Corpn. (Election of Councillors) Rules, 1964. Among other things, it is pointed out that the ballot paper is prepared in a foil and a counter-foil, provision being made for taking the signature of the voter on the counter-foil before the foil is issued to him. ( 5 ) IN the course of the study of the rules, the provisions of rule 6 appeared to be of assistance in solving the difficulty. That rule provides for the appointment of Presiding Officers and Polling Officers for each polling station. Sub-rules (2) and (3) thereof read as follows:" (2) A Polling Officer, if so directed by the Presiding Officer, shall perform all or any of the functions of a Presiding Officer. (3) If the Presiding Officer, owing to illness or other unavoidable cause, is obliged to absent himself from the polling station, his functions shall be performed by such Poling Officer as has been previously authorised by the Returning Officer to perform such functions during any such absence. " ( 6 ) THE appointment order relating to the petitioner produced as ex. B empowers him 'to authorise the Polling Officer specified in column 3 of the Table" annexed to it to perform the functions of the Presiding Officer during his unavoidable absence, if any. ( 7 ) IT cannot, therefore, be contended that though polling has to take place continuously, the Presiding Officer cannot at all leave his station. The rule cited above does visualise the possibility of occasions arising when the Presiding Officer may unavoidably have to absent himself from the polling station and makes provision for the discharge of his functions by authorising one of the Polling Officers. ( 8 ) AS every voter is entitled to cast his vote and he cannot do so except on the polling day fixed for the purpose, it can certainly be said that the absence of the Presiding Officer from any polling Station for such time as may be reasonable for him to go out and cast his vote at the polling station at which he is to vote, is unavoidable. ( 9 ) SUCH being the clear effect of the law and the rules, we do not think that any further direction by us in the form of a writ is called for. The law itself contains both a mandate for the performance of duties and the liberty to exercise the right to vote. ( 10 ) WE therefore decline to issue any writ or direction and dismiss the Writ Petition. --- *** --- .