S. B. SINHA, C. J. ( 1 ) AN interesting question which arises for consideration in this appeal is, as to whether having regard rule 6 (1) of the Andhra Pradesh Municipal council/nagar Panchayats (Co-option of members having special knowledge or experience in Municipal Administration) rules, 1995 (for short the Rules ), co-option of a member to the Municipal Council would constitute to be an election? ( 2 ) THE appellants-writ petitioners herein are seeking to be co-opted as members of the Kavali Municipal Council, Nellore district. They filed their applications for nomination under the category of persons having special knowledge and experience in municipal Administration. For the said purpose, a meeting of the Municipal Council was held on 7-6-2000. It is not in dispute that the total strength of the Municipal council is 30 and one-half thereof constitutes the quorum. In the meeting of the Council held on 7-6-2000, they were elected as co-opted members. However the member of the Legislative Assembly who is the Ex-Office member of the Council though attended the meeting, expressed his dissent. He, thereafter filed a petition before the government under Section 59 of municipalities Act, 1965 on the ground that there was no quorum and the mandatory requirement of seven days clear notice to convene the meeting of the Council had not been adhered to. In the said proceedings, the Government in G. O. Ms. No. 367, dated 26-6-2000 passed an interim order suspending the resolution dated 7-6-2000 of the Council pending further enquiry. The present writ petition has been filed as despite a representation made in this regard, the stay has not been vacated. ( 3 ) A learned single Judge of this court by the order impugned herein refused to go into the contentions raised by the appellants on the ground that the matter is pending before the Government and disposed of the writ application with a direction upon the 1st respondent to dispose of the representation filed by the petitioners within a period of four weeks from the date of receipt of a copy of the said order. ( 4 ) WHEN a matter is pending before an appropriate authority, normally, the Writ court, in exercise of its jurisdiction under article 226 of the Constitution of India, would not go into the merits of the matter. ( 4 ) WHEN a matter is pending before an appropriate authority, normally, the Writ court, in exercise of its jurisdiction under article 226 of the Constitution of India, would not go into the merits of the matter. But, a writ of prohibition may be issued when it is found that the statutory Tribunal intends to exercise its jurisdiction which it inherently lacks. ( 5 ) THE only question which has been raised by Mr. T. Jagadish, learned Counsel appearing on behalf of the petitioner is that co-option would amount to election and in that view of the matter, Section 59 of the act is not attracted and as such the 1st respondent has no jurisdiction to entertain the application filed before it. ( 6 ) WITH a view to answer the aforementioned question, we may notice the relevant provisions. "59. Government s power to cancel or suspend resolutions etc. : (1) The government may, either suo motu or on representation of any Councillor, the chairman or the Commissioner by order in writing : (i) Cancel any resolution passed, order issued, or licence or permission granted; or (ii) Prohibit the doing of any act which is about to be done or is being done, in pursuance or under colour of this Act, if in their opinion (a) such resolution, order, licence, permission or Act has not been passed, issued, granted or authorised in accordance with law; or (b) such resolution, order, licence, permission or Act is in excess of the powers conferred by this Act or any other enactment; or (c) the execution of such resolution, or order, the continuance in force of such licence or permission or the doing of such act is likely to cause, financial loss to municipality, danger to human life, health or safety or is likely to lead to a riot or breach of peace or is against public interest: provided that the Government shall, before taking action under this section on any of the grounds referred to in clauses (a) and (b), given the authority or person concerned an opportunity for explanation; provided further that nothing in this sub-section shall enable the Government to set aside any election which has been held. (2) If, in the opinion of the Government, immediate action is necessary on any of the grounds referred to in clause (c) of sub-section (1), they may suspend the resolution, order, licence, permission or act, as the case may be, for such period as they think fit pending the exercise of the powers under sub-section (1)". ( 7 ) THE Government of Andhra pradesh in exercise of the powers conferred by sub-section (1) of Section 326 of the andhra Pradesh Municipalities Act, 1965 (Act 6 of 1965) made the Rules known as a. P. Municipal Councils/nagar Panchayats (Co-option of Members having Special knowledge or Experience in Municipal administration) Rules, 1995. ( 8 ) THE words election and co-option had not been defined either in the act or in the Rules. Election and co-option connote two different things. Since they are not defined in the Act or the Rules, we may notice dictionary meaning of the same. The Concise Oxford Dictionary, 1990 edition, defines election as under: "the process of electing or being elected esp. members of a political body, the act or an instance of electing". In the same dictionary, the word co-opt has been defined as under: "appoint to membership of a body by invitation of the existing members. " in Webster s New Twentieth Century (2nd edition) at page. 582, election has been defined: "1. the act of choosing or choice 2. The act of choosing a person to fill an office or position by vote. " at page 402, the word co-opt has been defined: "to add to a group by vote of those already members, to appoint as an associate" ( 9 ) THUS, it would be seen that election and co-option convey two different connotations. Section 3 of the rules provides for the qualifications as regards the persons eligible to be co-opted as a member of the Municipal Council. Rule 5 provides for the procedure for co-option of members. Sub-rule (1) of Rule 6 provides that in case there are more number of eligible applicants than the number of persons to be co-opted, the Municipal council shall co-opt the required number of persons by a voice vote. ( 10 ) ONE of the principles of interpretation of a statute is that all the provisions must be read together harmoniously. Sub-rule (1) of Rule 6 provides that in case there are more number of eligible applicants than the number of persons to be co-opted, the Municipal council shall co-opt the required number of persons by a voice vote. ( 10 ) ONE of the principles of interpretation of a statute is that all the provisions must be read together harmoniously. The provision of sub-rule (1) of Rule 6 of the rules has to be taken recourse to only in a case where the number of eligible applicants are more than the number of persons to be co-opted. If the number of eligible applicants and the number of persons to be co-opted are equal, then the question of taking recourse to the provisions of Rule 6 shall not arise. ( 11 ) CO-OPTION of the members by the municipal Council under the aforementioned rules would not be according to the personal choice or having regard to the affinity to the political party to which an eligible applicant belongs or of which he is a supporter. The same is required to be made having regard to the special knowledge or experience of the applicant in the municipal Administration. ( 12 ) ONLY a person who comes within the purview of Rule 3 of the Rules can be co-opted as member to the Municipal council. Co-option, therefore, has a nexus with the qualifications held by the applicants who filed applications for being co-opted. In a case of this nature, the Councillors are required to satisfy themselves as who amongst the candidates applied for co-option would be better suited for the purpose. Thus, in that sense, it would amount to selection and not election. ( 13 ) RULE 6 merely provides for the manner in which the opinion of the municipal Councillors can be expressed. The words voice vote , in our opinion, would not necessarily mean that thereby the members are elected and not co-opted. We are of the opinion that in a case of this nature, the intent and. purport of the legislature must be culled out by applying the principle of purposive construction and, thus, it is not a case where the rule of literal or strict interpretation can be applied. We are of the opinion that in a case of this nature, the intent and. purport of the legislature must be culled out by applying the principle of purposive construction and, thus, it is not a case where the rule of literal or strict interpretation can be applied. ( 14 ) IT is now a well settled principle of law that rules of purposive construction have to be taken recourse to for giving full effect to the object and purpose for which rules have been framed. In Ananta kumar Bej v. State of W. B. , 1999 (4) SLR 661, it has been noticed:"it is a well settled principles of law that despites absence of a rule, the Selection committee is entitled to short list the candidates. Rule 9 (c) (ii) of the rules only give a statutory recognition to the aforementioned service jurisprudence. In a case of this nature, therefore, the doctrine of purposive interpretation should be invoked, and in such a situation the word written test must be held to be incorporated within the word interview . The answer to the question posed in this appeal, thus in the opinion of this Court, should be rendered in affirmative as otherwise the word written examination would become totally otiose. Such a construction is permissible by taking recourse to the doctrine of strained construction, as has been elaborately dealt in by Francis bennion in his Statutory Interpretation. "at Section 304, the treatise purposive construction, has been described in the following mannen-"a purposive construction of an enactment is one which gives effect to the legislative purpose by (a) following the literal meaning of the enactment where that meaning is in accordance with the legislative purpose (in this Code called a purposive - and - literal construction), or (b) applying a strained meaning where the literal meaning is not in accordance with the legislative purpose (in the Code called a purposive-and-strained construction ). In D. P. P. v. Schildkamp, (1971) AC 1, it was held that the rule that severance may be effected even where the blue pencil technique is impracticable. "in Jones v. Wrotham Park Settled Estates, (1980) AC 74 at page 105, the law is stated in the following term :". . . . . . . . In D. P. P. v. Schildkamp, (1971) AC 1, it was held that the rule that severance may be effected even where the blue pencil technique is impracticable. "in Jones v. Wrotham Park Settled Estates, (1980) AC 74 at page 105, the law is stated in the following term :". . . . . . . . I am not reluctant to adopt a purposive construction where to apply the literal meaning of the legislative language used would lead to results which would clearly defeat the purposes of the Act. But in doing so the task on which a Court of justice is engaged remains one of construction, even where this involves reading into the Act words which are not expressly included in it. Kammins Ballrooms Co. Ltd. v. Zenith investments (Torquay) Ltd. , (1971 AC 850) provides an instance of this; but in that case the three conditions that must be fulfilled in order to justify this course were satisfied. First, it was possible to determine from a consideration of the provisions of the Act read as a whole precisely what the mischief was that it was the purpose of the Act to remedy; secondly, it was apparent that the draftsman and Parliament had by inadvertence overlooked, and so omitted to deal with an eventuality that required to be dealt with if the purpose of the Act was to be achieved; and thirdly, it was possible to state with certainty what were the additional words that would have been inserted by the draftsman and approved by Parliament had their attention been drawn to the omission before the Bill passed into law. Unless this third condition is fulfilled any attempt by a Court of justice to repair the omission in the act cannot be justified as an exercise of its jurisdiction to determine what is the meaning of a written law which parliament has passed. "in Principles of Statutory Interpretation of Justice G. P. Singh, 5th Edition, 1992, it is stated:-"the Supreme Court in Bangalore Water supply v. A. Rajappa ( AIR 1978 SC 548 ) approved the rule of construction stated by Denning, L. J. while dealing with the definition of industry in the industrial Disputes Act, 1947. The definition is so general and ambiguous that BEG, C. J. , said that the situation called for "some judicial heroics to cope with the difficulties raised". The definition is so general and ambiguous that BEG, C. J. , said that the situation called for "some judicial heroics to cope with the difficulties raised". K. Iyer, J. , who delivered the leading majority judgment in that case referred with approbation the passage extracted above from the judgment of Denning, L. J. , in seaford Court Estates Ltd. v. Asher. But in the same continuation he also cited a passage from the speech of Lord Simonds in the case of Magor and St. Mellons RDC v. Newsport Corporation, 1951 (2) All. ER 839, as if it also found a part of the judgment of Denning, L. J. This passage reads : "the duty of the Court is to interpret the words that the Legislature has used. Those words may be ambiguous, but, even if they are, the power and duty of the Court to travel outside them on a voyage of discovery are strictly limited". As earlier noticed lord Simonds and other Law Lords in magor and St. Mellon s case were highly critical of the views of Denning, L. J. However, as submitted above, the criticism is more because of the unconventional manner in which the rule of construction was stated by him. In this connection it is pertinent to remember that although a Court cannot supply a real casus omissus it is equally clear that it should not so interpret a statute as to create a casus omissus when there is really none". ( 15 ) IN Ch. Lakshminarayana v. Principal Subordinate Judge, Srikakulam, 1997 (6) ALT 814 , although the point did not come up for consideration directly before a learned single Judge, it was observed:"on a consideration of the rival submissions, I am of the opinion that the co-option of the members cannot be regarded as an election, and therefore, the learned Subordinate Judge was right in holding that the petition was not maintainable. Even with regard to the selection process also, I am satisfied that there was nothing arbitrary in the procedure". ( 16 ) THE decision of this Court in venkata Rao v. Government of Andhra pradesh, 1983 (1) ALT 387, relied upon by sri Jagadish, learned Counsel appearing for the appellant does not have any application as in the said case the question of validity of a notice has come up for consideration before a learned single Judge of this Court. ( 17 ) IN B. K. Garad v. Nasik Merchants co-operative Bank Ltd. , AIR 1984 SC 192 , it was observed:"before going in search of any external aids of construction, let us look at the language employed by the Legislature because no canon of construction can be aid to be more firmly established than this that the Legislature uses appropriate language to manifest its intention. No controversy was raised with regard to the power of the Legislature to prescribe reservation of seats in the committee in which the management of the society vests. The use of the expression shall in Section 73-B clearly mandates obligation reserve. The next question is how the reserved seats are to be filled in? The section itself clearly manifests legislative intention when it says that if no such persons are elected or appointed , the reserved seats may be filled by co-option. Therefore, the pride of place is accorded to election of persons eligible to fill in reserved seats. Let there be no mistake that there is no reserved constituency which may divide the society or the electorate. The constituency is the general constituency. Only the seats are reserved. This would imply that the general body of members will elect persons eligible to fill in reserved seats". ( 18 ) FOR the reasons aforementioned, we are of the opinion that it is not a case where a writ of prohibition may be issued. There is thus no merit in the appeal which is accordingly dismissed. We may, however, place on record that we have not gone into merits of the case. There shall be no order as to costs.