- (1.) A. N. Verma, J. These two petitions are being disposed of by a common judgment as the controversy involved therein is the same. The petitioners claim that they were validly admitted by the Tilakdhari Post Graduate College, Jaunpur to the B. Sc. (Agriculture) Part I course for the academic session 1982-83, but they were illegally refused by the Gorakhpur University, to which the said College was affiliated, permission to appear at the B. Sc. (Agriculture) Part I Examination, beginning from April 9, 1983. Writ Petition No. 4380 of 1983 was filed on April 7, 1983 and under an interim order of this Court, the petitioners of that petition were provisionally permitted to appear at the said examination. The petitioners of Writ Petition No. 11116 of 1983, on the other hand, appeared at the said examination on the strength of an injunction order issued in a suit filed by them for a mandatory injunction commanding the University and the College to allow the petitioners to appear at the said examination.
(2.) WRIT Petition No. 4380 of 1983 was initially filed by 172 petitioners but subsequently an application was moved whereby 134 petitioners got the petition dismissed as not pressed. The remaining 38 petitioners have, however, pressed this petition on merits. The other petition, namely, WRIT Petition No. 11116 of 1983 has been filed by 18 petitioners in September 1983 after they got their suit dismissed as withdrawn. When this petition came up for hearing, we directed the University to inform the Court as to how many out of these petitioners had passed the examination at which they were permitted to appear under orders of stay granted by this Court and the injunction issued by the Civil Court. In pursuance of that direction, the Gorakhpur University filed a supplementary affidavit stating that in the batch of petitioners of Writ Petition No. 4380 of 1983 only one petitioner out of 38 passed the examination. The rest have failed. In the other petition No. 11116 of 1983 out of 18 only 3 have passed, the remaining having failed. The relevant facts as we have been able to cull out from the various affidavits and the original record produced by the University pertaining to the admissions made by this College for the B. Sc. (Agriculture) Part I Course are that one Dr. P. K. Singh was the permanent principal of the College. He was placed under suspension from August 16, 1982 to August 26, 1982. During his absence Sri R. N. Singh officiated as the principal up to September 3, 1982. On August 25, 1982 Sri R. N. Singh finalized the list of admission of 180 candidates with the help of the Admissions Committee of the College with Sri N. K. Singh as its convenor. In pursuance of this list, admissions were made between August 30, 1982 and September 9, 1982. Dr. P. K. Singh rejoined on September 4, 1982. He appears to have prepared another list of 169 students for admission to the aforesaid Course. Subsequently, he admitted some more students as a result of which the number of the students admitted by him rose to 180. The petitioners of Writ Petition No. 4380 of 1983 are those who were admitted by Sri R. N. Singh, while the petitioners of Writ Petition No. 11116 of 1983 are from the list of 180 students admitted by Dr. P. K. Singh. The petitioners assert that in pursuance of the admissions made by the two principals they deposited admission fee as well as other fees and they regularly attended both the practical and theory classes. They further assert that they had also duly deposited the examination fee which the College, in its turn, remitted to the University in December, 1982.
(3.) ADMISSIONS to various courses of studies in the University and affiliated College are regulated by Section 28 of the U. P. State Universities Act. Under that provision the ADMISSIONS Committee of the University lays down the norms for admission and issues directions as respects the criteria or methods of admissions to the various affiliated colleges in the matter of admission. The ADMISSIONS Committee of the Gorakhpur University had under this provision fixed the number of seats for the B. Sc. (Agriculture) Part I Examination for this College at 180 and had also sent to the College the criteria and the norms for admissions. In December the University received a complaint to the effect that the permanent Principal as well as the officiating Principal of this College had, during their respective terms in office, admitted 180 students each, i. e. a total of 360 students and that gross irregularities had been committed in the matter of admissions. Consequently, a show cause notice was issued to the Manager of the College by the University to send his report by December 31, 1982. The Manager sent his reply on December 29, 1982. Thereafter certain queries were made by the University from the Manager as well as the two principals of the College. On receipt of the comments of the principals and the manager, the Vice-Chancellor appointed an Enquiry Committee consisting of Dr. D. P. Misra, then Dean of the Faculty of Agriculture and the Deputy Registrar (Affiliation) of the University. This Committee inspected the records of the College on March 8, 10 and 17, 1983. Thereafter the Committee submitted its report according to which it transpired that both the principals had admitted students without regard to the criteria and the norms laid down by the Admissions Committee of the University under S. 28 of the U. P. State Universities Act. It further transpired that 360 students had been admitted, whereas the sanctioned limit was 180 students.;