G.S.SANDHAWALIA, J. - (1.) THE present writ petition has been filed seeking a direction that the respondent -University should declare the result of B.Tech 8th semester examination of the petitioners and supply their detailed mark cards and B.Tech degrees. Apart from seeking the relief of compensation from respondents no. 1 to 12 for harassment and mental torture.
(2.) THE pleaded case of the petitioners is that they were admitted in the 4 years/8 semesters course of B.Tech (Electrical and Communication Engineering) for the academic session 2009 -10 with the respondent no. 6 - college i.e. Chandigarh Engineering College, Landran, District Mohali in Punjab. The said college is affiliated to respondent no. 1 - Punjab Technical University. In the 8th semester, the petitioners were required to undergo industrial training for six months and the petitioners were recommended by their college for industrial training to the Terminal Ballastics Research Laboratory, Chandigarh (TBRL), Ministry of Defence, Government of India. The petitioners were placed in the Bunker Blasting Group by the Head of the Research Department (HRD) of the TBRL and were required to report for training at the TBRL Range, Ramgarh. The said training was to last for six months from January 2013 to June 2013, which would be apparent from e -mail dated 03.01.2013 (Annexure P -9) whereas they were required to report initially on 21.12.2012 as per e -mail dated 17.12.2012 (Annexure P -10). The training was with a group of Scientists namely Mr. R.S. Bisht (Scientist F), Sh. M.K. Sharma (Scientist E) and the group head Dr. A.K. Sharma (Scientist F) -respondent no. 8. The petitioners were allotted the project "Spectroscopic Analysis of Shock Synthesized materials, using Specialized Electronic Equipments." For undertaking the training, the petitioners went to Ramgarh and worked under the above group of Scientists and were also sent to the department of Physics, Himachal Pardesh University on the request of respondent no. 8 to work on the said project. It is, however, pleaded that this was done by respondent no. 8 as he was himself working on the said research project and thus they went to Shimla to avoid annoying the Group Head Dr. A.K. Sharma. It was further alleged that the said respondent made them to work various personal and awkward works which should not have been worked from female trainees and he himself was preparing for his interview for promotion which was to be held on 21.05.2013 and the petitioners were asked to enable him to prepare for his interview. The mid term reports had to be submitted to the college authorities during March, 2013, which was duly done. The petitioners had submitted complaints dated 15.05.2013 to the Director, TBRL against respondent no. 8 and they completed the said project and the final viva was scheduled to be held on 20.05.2013 to 22.05.2013 by the college and various documents were asked for. Since the petitioners had completed their project which was the mandatory requirement, they asked respondent no. 8 to prepare the necessary final evaluation reports but he was adamant not to submit the same till the end of June, 2013 even though their work had been completed in May, 2013 itself. Many other similarly placed students of the petitioner - college itself with Industrial Training under the DRDO at different stations and many other similarly placed students of various other colleges affiliated to PTU were issued final evaluation reports and other necessary documents by their training Instructors/Supervisors without any difficulty. But due to the adamant attitude of respondent no. 8, they were harassed and they made complaints to the Director, TBRL. Eventually, the final reports were issued by Dr. M.K. Sharma (Scientist E). Thereafter, certificate dated 12.07.2013 (Annexure P -20) was also issued that the petitioners had undergone the industrial training in the TBRL by Dr. Amarjit Singh (Scientist G), Associate Director, TBRL. Similar certificates were also issued on 12.07.2013 regarding the industrial training undergone from 08.01.2013 to 30.06.2013 by Dr. V.K. Devgan, Group Director, HRD (Annexures P -21 and P -22). The college had sent the marks of the exams and of the vivas but result of the petitioners against their roll numbers was withheld. On complaint, they came to know that respondent no. 8 had used his influence with the Vice Chancellor of respondent no. 1 -University and the results were withheld on account of the complaint filed by him. Thereafter, the petitioners were called before an inquiry committee on 15.07.2013 on the complaint of respondent no. 8. The petitioners alongwith petitioner no. 1's mother and petitioner no. 2's father went to the University at Jalandhar wherein, respondents no. 9 to 12 were part of the inquiry committee and started pressurizing the petitioners for withdrawing their complaints (Annexures P -13 and P -14), which they had filed before the Director. The said committee had never disclosed that what were the allegations levelled against the petitioners by respondent no. 8 but kept on harassing the petitioners to withdraw their complaints on the ground that the training would be treated invalid and their academic year would be wasted. The alleged inquiry was a farce exercise and they had proceeded against the same on 16.07.2013 by sending e -mails and RTI application was moved on 18.07.2013 but the respondent -university did not give the reply. A notice dated 30.07.2013 was received whereby, they were required to appear before the inquiry committee on 01.08.2013 by respondent no. 9 -Dr. Balkar Singh (Director, College Development). The petitioners alongwith their fathers managed to appear on the said date where respondent no. 8 was again present and a farce and biased inquiry was held which was objected against by sending separate e -mails on 02.08.2013. Respondent no. 8 had filed a complaint on 17.06.2013 (Annexure P -37), which was being acted upon illegally and on account of this, the result of the petitioners was not being declared. Resultantly, the present writ petition was filed pleading that the petitioners have been put to loss since during the training period, they had received offers from various companies but due to the non -declaration of result, they have been prejudiced.
(3.) IN the written statement filed by the respondent -university and on behalf of respondents no. 1 to 5 and 9 to 12, the plea taken was that the result was withheld because of the complaint made against the students by respondent no. 8 that the students had not returned the vital data and study material and samples which was handed over to them for spectroscopic analysis at Physics Department, Shimla. It has been alleged by Dr. A.K. Sharma that the students had fraudulently stolen their scientific work and reported the same for award of B.Tech. degree without his concurrence and approval. The committee had been constituted to call for the record of the students and the information had been asked for on the complaint of respondent no. 8 dated 07.06.2013 (Annexure R -1). The Director of TBRL had been informed regarding the same vide communication dated 27.06.2013 (Annexure R -3) asking for response to the case and the petitioner had also been asked to come present on 15.07.2013. In the meeting held on 15.07.2013, the petitioners had been asked to give their statements in writing to the Committee for record but they refused to do same. Then they were given a questionnaire but without submitting any reply and without giving any intimation, both the petitioners left the university and both the parties were called again on 29.07.2013. The minutes of the meeting dated 15.07.2013 were attached (Annexure R -7). No meeting was held on 29.07.2013 but it was held on 01.08.2013 in which respondent no. 8 was also present and petitioners with their parents were also there. The petitioners and their parents refused to answer the written question proforma which was provided to them by the inquiry committee and the inquiry committee had recommended that a technical committee should be constituted having members from the field of Physics Material Science to evaluate the claim of Dr. A.K. Sharma on the said research work and the data published in the papers submitted by the trainees and the result was to be declared after the decision of the Technical Committee. The report dated 01.08.2013 was attached as Annexures R -9 and R -10. A technical committee was constituted of Dr. Ravi Kumar, Principal, Beant College of Engineering and Technology, Gurdaspur, Dr. A.K. Tyagi, Shaheed Bhagat Singh College of Engineering, Ferozepur, Dr. Hitesh Kumar, Assistant Professor, PTU, Er. Navdeepak Sandhu, Placement Officer, PTU as convener. The said committee had scanned the work and found that there was ample evidence that the report of the students was resembling the interim reports signed by Dr. A.K. Sharma and the students should be asked to take a certificate from Dr. A.K. Sharma for work reported in their final report and TBRL Authorities be requested to discourage last minutes change of supervision to avoid these type of cases. The recommendation of the Committee dated 13.09.2013 was attached as Annexure R -12. Accordingly, the result stood withheld because the petitioners had used the research material of Dr. A.K. Sharma and false and frivolous allegations were levelled against the university.;