K D DWIVEDI KELAVANI MANDAL Vs. STATE OF GUJARAT

JUDGEMENT

(1.) . This is a petition by two Trustees of two different trusts registered as such under the name and style of R. R. Dwivedi Kelvani Mandal and the Mayur Kelvani Mandal respectively. The Trustees of the first Trust has been running a secondary school known as Ramanuj Vidyalaya. Under the provisions of the Gujarat Secondary Education Act 1972 that is sec. 31 thereof; this school was required to be registered and admittedly this school was registered. At some time that is around the year 1977 the Trustees of the first Trust were facing financial difficulties and so they had initially decided to close down the school and they had approached the Board constituted under the Gujarat Secondary Education Act and hereinafter referred to as `the Board by making an application under sec. 44 of the Act because no manager of a registered private secondary school is entitled to close down the school without giving notice in writing of his intention so to do to the Board at least six months before the date with effect from which the school is proposed to be closed down. Sec. 44(1) does not speak of any sanction of the Board for the purpose of closing down the school. All that it requires is that the management should give a notice of closure. The application for that purpose was made on 30-11-77 and the school was intended to be closed at the end of the academic year in June 1978. So six months notice was given. The Board did not give any reply to that letter. On 3-1-78 the Board asked the petitioner no. 1 to send the resolution of the Board of Trustees of the first public Trust in that regard. The resolution was sent hut no reply was given and it is possible that no reply was required to be given under sec. 44 of the Act.

(2.) . In April 1978 the Trustees of the first Trust decided to transfer the school to the petitioner no. 2 and approached the Board for the purpose of granting permission to transfer. There is no provision in law clothing the Board with the authority to grant the permission for transfer as such. All that sec. 31 and the Regulation 9(7) of the Secondary Education Regulations 1974 provide for is to register and to continue to treat the school as registered though it is to be conceded that in the power to continue the school to be registered the power to discontinue registration is also implicitly there. The said application is Annexure A to the petition and it is dated 19-4-78. In July or August 1978 the Board gave the reply that permission to close down the school was granted and the prayer to accord sanction to transfer was rejected. Both these petitioners had therefore filed the special civil application no. 1414 of 1978 in this High Court for a writ prohibiting the Board from treating the petitioner-school in the name and style of Ramanuj Vidyalaya to have been closed and also directing the respondents to recognise the management of the said school by the petitioner no. 2-Trust. When the matter was before my Brother P. D. Desai J. on 30-1-79 the learned advocate appearing for the Board stated that both the orders stood cancelled and that in case the petitioner no. 2 made an application in compliance with Regulation 9(10) of the Regulations 1974 within a period of 15 days from 30-1-79 such application would be considered and decided on merits as expeditiously as possible. It was further provided in that order that in case the petitioner no. 2 (who is the petitioner no. 2 in this petition also) did not make any application within the aforesaid time limit it would be open to the respondent no. 2 to take such action as it deems fit in the circumstances of the case. The petition therefore ultimately was held to be not surviving and therefore rejected at that stage.

(3.) Then both the petitioners made a fresh application within 15 days. On 3-3-79 the Board addressed a letter to the petitioner no. 2 that they should as the proof of financial stability of the petitioner no. 2 deposit jointly in the account of the President of the Trust and the District Education Officer the amount of Rs. 10 0 per class of the school sought to be continued to be run. The petitioners no. 2 was informed that on that direction being complied with further action on the application would be taken in accordance with law. The petitioners again rushed to this court by challenging that direction contained in Annexure D.