E.V.P. and Padmavathi Educational Trust and another, Chennai, Petitioners v. All India Council for Technical Education and another, Chennai, Respondents.

S.S. SUBRAMANI, J.

Constitution of India, Articles 226, 14 -Establishment of Technical Institution Application for permission to start institution - Rejection of, on basis of Expert Committee Report -Copy of said report not placed before applicant - Applicants neither informed about defects in Institution - Nor reasonable time given to rectify defects - Order rejecting application on flimsy grounds - Not proper.

Both these petitioners wanted to start a Technical Institution for which a letter of viability was issued by the respondents. The petitioners informed the respondents that they have satisfied all the conditions in the letter of viability and they requested them to give permission to start the Institution.

It is pursuant to the said request, the impugned orders have been passed rejecting the same.

... It is alleged that the impugned order violates the principle of natural justice. The reason for such a contention is that the Expert Committee visited these institutions, they gave the impression that all the conditions have been complied with. But, only when the  orders came, they came to know that the report is not in their favour. According to the petitioners, a copy of the Expert Committee Report should have been given to them so that they could have explained how the report is bad.

It is also said that it is the practice of the respondents to inform the applicants about the defects in the Institution and a reasonable time is also given to rectify the same. In this case, that practice was put to an end, without any reason ..

... The petitioners are entitled to have a copy of the Inspection Report. If any adverse material is to be relied on by the respondents against the petitioners and which is the only basis for the decision, the petitioners should have been informed about the contents of that document ...

... I find none of the reasons mentioned in the impugned letter can be supported and I feel that the intention of the respondents is only to reject the application for some imaginary reason ...

It seems to be the attitude of the respondents that they have learnt only to reject the application for some reason or other and they have not considered the legal position, even though the same has been repeatedly informed to them by various decisions of this Court. The approach should be whether there are minimum facilities available for starting an Institution and whether with that minimum requirements, the Institute can go on. The approach should not be to reject all the applications on the basis of flimsy grounds. It is unfortunate that the Authorities have failed to follow this, whenever an application is being filed for seeking permission to establish an Institution. Merely because a permission is required to be sought for, the Authorities should not think that they are above the law and their action cannot be challenged. Their action should be reasonable. When the State is not in a position to establish the colleges as is required, private educational institutions are coming forward and take up that responsibility. When that responsibility is taken up by them, the attitude of the respondents should not be to defeat the good intention of these applicants.

In the result, the impugned orders are quashed and there will be a direction to the respondents to reconsider their decision and they are directed to pass fresh orders on the applications of the petitioners within a period of three weeks from today.  (Source: AIR 1999 Madras 290)