ORDER 1. The parties are agreed that if writ petition No. 831/97 is dismissed then nothing would survive for deciding writ petition No.1 019/97. 2. I am of the opinion that no case is made out in writ petition No. 831/97. Before giving reasons, facts in brief be noticed. 3. There is a Municipal Council in the city of Vidisha. The petitioner is one of the councillers. According to him, a resolution with a view to express no-confidence in the respondent Basant Kumar Jain, Vice President was moved. It is not in dispute that 23 members voted in favour of the motion. By mathematical calculation, the respondent-authorities came to the conclusion that the motion has not been carried on. The Vice President was held entitled to continue as Vice President. 4. The relevant provisions which deal with expressing no confidence in a Vice President of a Municipal Council are contained in section 43-A (1) of the M.P. Municipalities Act, 1961. These be noticed: "43-A (1) A motion of no-confidence may be moved against the Vice President by any elected Counciller at a meeting specially convened for the purpose under sub-section (2) and if the motion, is carried by a majority of two thirds of the elected Councillers present and voting in the meeting and if such majority is more than half of the total number of elected councillers constituting the Council, the office of the Vice President, shall be deemed to have become vacant forthwith a copy of such motion shall be sent by the Chief Municipal Officer to the Collector forthwith for filing up the vacancy.' A perusal of the aforemetioned section makes it apparent that in order that a motion can be said to have been duly carried out, following factors are required to be present: (i) the motion has to be carried out by a majority of 2/3rds of the elected councillers present and voting in the meeting; (ii) the motion has again to be carried out by a majority of total number of elected councillers constituting the council. 5. In the present case, the total number of members of the Municipal Council, Vidisha is 35. All the thirty five members took part in the proceedings. As indicated above, 23 councillers voted in favour of the motion. 5. In the present case, the total number of members of the Municipal Council, Vidisha is 35. All the thirty five members took part in the proceedings. As indicated above, 23 councillers voted in favour of the motion. As the respondent-authorities were of the view that the figure of 23 was short of 2/3rds majority, the motion was said to have not been duly carried out. 6. I am of the opinion that the reasoning given by the authorities is in accordance with law. 7. Before noticing the decision referred to above by the learned counsel for the Vice President who has not been arrayed by name, reference be made to a Division Bench Judgment of this Court reported as Pooran Mal v. State of M.P. 1975 JLJ SN 18. The total number of councillers was six. Five of them participated in the meeting. Three councillers expressed their no-confidence. This Court was of the opinion that the motion was not carried out properly as only three members had voted in favour of the no-confidence motion and it could not be said that more than half the councillers had approved of the resolution; the reasoning being that there should have been more than three councillers and when only three participants it would not satisfy the statutory mandate. 8. The other question as to whether the decimal figure has to be ignored or not was not adverted to and no decision was given. Then above decision does not come to the rescue of the petitioner. 9. The learned counsel for the petitioner has placed reliance on Article 55 (1) (c) of the Constitution of India. This Article deals with election to the office of President of India. The above provisions would not be attracted to the facts of this case. In this case, what is required to be interpreted is the Act applicable to the Municipal Councils. 10. The learned counsel for the respondent has placed reliance on a decision reported as Sheikh Abdul Rahim v. State, 1974 MPLJ SN 105. The Division Bench was of the view that even a fragment of 1/3rd can be taken into consideration for determining the validity of a resolution. In the above case, the Panchayat had 19 members. The presence of 1/3rd members was required. This came to 6 1/3. The Division Bench was of the view that even a fragment of 1/3rd can be taken into consideration for determining the validity of a resolution. In the above case, the Panchayat had 19 members. The presence of 1/3rd members was required. This came to 6 1/3. It was held that in such a case, the quorum has to be of7 members and not 6. The decision in this case is similar. The two-thirds in the present case would be more than 23 councillers and this would mean that there should be 24 members who should vote for the motion. This has not happened in this case. Similar view has been expressed in another Division Bench judgment in the case of Laxmi Narayan Garg v. Municipal Council Sardarpur and others, 1977 JLJ SN 63. These two decisions squarely apply to the facts of this case. Even otherwise, a penal provision which leads to the drastic result of depriving a citizen of a right to enjoy elected office has to be strictly construed. Unless and until there is strict compliance, no benefit can be given to the otherwise. 11. Another argument which has been raised by the learned counsel for the petitioner is that the language used in section 47 A is that the resolution has to be carried out by 2/3rd members and not by more than 2/3rds. I am of the opinion that this argument would only apply to a situation where there was a break-even point and that point was exactly 2/3rd. This is not the position in this case. The argument does not apply to this case and therefore it is noticed and rejected. 12. Another argument which has been raised is that where this fragment is more than 1/4 it should be counted as one. A penal provision is to be construed with a view to protect the rights of the citizen and not with a view to deprive them of the rights. Taking into consideration this aspect of the matter, the writ petition filed by petitioner as W.P. 831/97 is dismissed. Writ Petition No. 1019/97 would be rendered infructuous and is disposed of accordingly. There would be no order as to costs.