Bhagabati Prosad Banerjee, J. - (1.) This writ application has been filed by Gurudas Das Gupta by way of a public interest litigation for protecting the interest of a large 1 number of students as well as the teachers of Jullian Day School,situated at 2/1C, Townshend Road, Calcutta-25. The petitioner Gurudas Das Gupta is a sitting member of Parliament in Rajya Sabba and a very eminent person and is interested in education and welfare of the students and the teachers in this State.
(2.) The reason for moving the writ application was that the said school was functioning as a primary school since 1989 under the management of Julian Charitable & Educational Trust (referred to as the 'Trust') and is by now running with 1500 students, prosecuting their studies in the school from class-VII upwards, apart from students reading up to that class and that the Principal of the said school 1 held a meeting on March 19, 1996, with the teachers and informed the teachers that the Indian Council for Secondary Education has rejected the application for affiliation and also informed the teachers that the school authorities would close down the school from Class-VII upwards after announcing the results of the atonal examination of the students and it is stated that in spite of request). made by the teachers the said Principal did not disclose reason for rejecting the application for affiliation. This information bad created an alarming effect on 50 teachers and 1500 students. The matter was highlighted in several newspapers and had assumed a matter of great public interest Under such circumstances, the petitioner moved this writ application for compelling the said school authorities to remove the shortcomings disclosed by the said Council in the letter dated August2, 1995, issued by the said Council for which the said school could not be considered for grant of provisional affiliation, as also for direction upon the Council to issue application to the said school immediately after the shortcomings are removed by the school authorities and to take necessary steps to control and supervise the act of the school authority. A prayer was also made for maintaining a status quo with regard to the service conditions of the teachers if the affiliation is granted by the said Council. The prayer was also made for restraining the said school authority from closing down the said school In this background, the writ application was filed by the petitioner, whereupon considering the principle laid down by the Supreme Court in the case of Unnikrishnan v. State of Andhra Pradesh reported in AIR 1993 SC 2178, an order was passed directing the said Jullian Charitable & Educational Trust not to close down the school without the leave of this Court, and the Indian Council of Secondary Education was directed to submit a report before this Court giving reasons for not granting affiliation to the school concerned and what would be the fate of the students when it was very difficult to get a berth in any Educational Institution in this State. Copies of the application was directed to be served to all the parties. The interim order of injunction was extended on April 17, 1596, in the presence of Counsel appearing for all the parties.
(3.) It was brought to the notice of the Court that the school authorities were insisting on transfer certificates to the students for creating conditions for closing down the school from Class-VI onwards, and an interim order of injunction was passed on May 6, 1996, directing the school authorities not to issue any transfer certificate in respect of any student without obtaining leave from this Court and the school authorities were directed not to withdraw the payment of salaries to the teachers in the existing scales, without prejudice to their rights. The school authorities were directed to supply a report regarding the removal of discrepancy pointed out by the Board. On June 3, 1996, one of the representatives of the Delhi Board was directed to be present in this Court The School authorities submitted a report, but no representative of the school was present in the Court. But the Counsel for the said Board appeared and filed an affidavit to justify their stand in not granting any provisional affiliation to the said school.;