ex officio
Meaning. By virtue of office; held or done because of the position a person holds.
A person is an ex officio member of a body when membership comes automatically with another office, not by separate election or appointment. For example, the Vice-President is ex officio Chairman of the Council of States (Article 64), and a District Collector may be ex officio chairman of several district committees.
When the person ceases to hold the main office, the ex officio position also ends, and the successor in office takes it. The term also describes powers a court or officer may exercise of its own accord because of its office, though Indian lawyers more often say suo motu for that.
Example
The Vice-President presides over the Rajya Sabha as its ex officio Chairman under Article 64, not by election to that House.
In Indian law
- Article 64, Constitution of India
See also
Read more in the study notes
- The Speaker and parliamentary privileges (Constitutional Law II)
- The Insurance Act, 1938 and the IRDAI (Insurance Law)
- National Biodiversity Authority, State Biodiversity Boards and Biodiversity Management Committees (Intellectual Property Rights II)
- Plant varieties: legal concepts, India's sui generis choice, and the PPV&FR Authority (Intellectual Property Rights II)
- Employees' State Insurance: evolution, scope and definitions (Labour and Industrial Law II)
- Employees' provident fund under the Code on Social Security (Labour and Industrial Law II)