- (1.) All the petitioners are colleges who are aggrieved about the letters issued by the Government on various dates which are impugned in the writ petitions that purport to take serious action if the colleges collected tuition fees from Scheduled Caste students. The letters draw the inspiration from a scheme of Post Matric Scholarship the Central Government has announced which is effective from 01.07.2010 for students belonging to Scheduled Caste for States in India. It is attached with several conditions which is not necessary for us to reproduce. It is admitted by a scheme which the Central Government has floated. The State Government undertakes the responsibility of making the scholarship payments to the eligible students. The scheme introduced by the Government itself spells out the mode of disbursal of scholarship which is as follows:- "In order to ensure timely payment of scholarship amount to the beneficiaries, the State Government/UT administrations are requested to avoid cash payment of scholarship amount and are required to issue instructions to all concerned that payment of scholarship should be made to beneficiaries through their accounts in post offices/banks with phased transition to Smart Cards."
(2.) It is again an admitted fact that the amount is not disbursed in the manner contemplated in the scheme and there is a particular history for this deviance as well.
(3.) There was an occasion when several colleges had approached this Court complaining that persons who joined the college for a year passed out of the college without paying the fee in view of directions from the Government that the colleges shall not collect tuition fee from SC students in view of the scholarship scheme. In the writ petition filed by Ramgarhia Polytechnic College and others in CWP No.21682 of 2012, it was contended that the Scheme which provided for disbursement of scholarship to the students was fraught with serious difficulties for colleges could not be compelled to chase the students who had passed out from the college without paying the fee. The Court, therefore, passed an order directing that in any situation of the Government not being in a position to release the scholarship in time to the students, colleges which could not collect the tuition fee from the students in view of the fact that the scholarship had not been released to them, the amount need not be disbursed to the students but the same will be transferred to the colleges directly if statements are prepared and given. This has worked for some time but it has again come with load of difficulties.;