Himachal Pradesh High Court
"Notice. Mr. J.K. Verma vs Ramasubramanian ) on 25 June, 2019
Bench: V .Ramasubramanian, Dharam Chand Chaudhary
CWP No.819 of 2019 .
25.06.2019 Present: Mr.B.C. Negi, Senior Advocate, with Mr.Pranay Pratap Singh, Advocate, for the petitioner.
Mr.Ashok Sharma, Advocate General, with Mr.Ranjan Sharma, Mr.Ashwani K. Sharma, Mr.Nand Lal Thakur, and Ms.Ritta Goswami, Additional Advocate Generals, for respondents.
The petitioner has come up with the above writ petition, challenging a notice issued by the District Program Officer on 11.04.2019 for shutting down Kindergarten School run by the petitioner, on the ground of certain deficiencies.
On 22.04.2019, while ordering notice, this Court passed an interim order in CMP No.3223 of 2019 to the following effect:
"Notice. Mr. J.K. Verma, learned
Additional Advocate General appears and
accepts service of notice on behalf of the respondents. Reply be filed within a week, as prayed. List on 2.5.2019.
When the conditions precedents to establish a play school like "Our Lady of Snows Kindergarten" in the case in hand are barrier free access, adequate circulation area, proper ventilation, play area, child friendly toilets etc. etc. As provided under the Regulatory Guidelines issued for setting up such schools by the Education division, National Commission for Protection of Child Rights, we direct the Secretary, District Legal Services Authority, Kullu to conduct inspection of "Our Lady of Snows Kindergarten", Dhalpur, District Kullu and submit a report on or before the next date as to whether ::: Downloaded on - 28/09/2019 23:58:36 :::HCHP the provisions of such facilities is made by the Management of the school or not. We will pass .
appropriate order in the application for interim on perusal of the report to be so submitted by the Secretary, District Legal Services Authority, Kullu, however, keeping in view the admission of large number children in the school, we deem it appropriate to stay the operation of the impugned order Annexure P-12 till then. Ordered accordingly".
Pursuant to the said order, the Secretary, District Legal Services Authority conducted an inspection and filed an inspection report on 25.05.2019. The report indicates a whole lot of deficiencies with regard to staff, building, minimum number of instructional hours per day, library, physical safety etc. In the light of said report, the learned Senior Counsel appearing for the petitioner seeks time to comply with and remove all the deficiencies.
Once it is admitted that there are deficiencies, which are borne out by the report of an independent agency, namely the Secretary, District Legal Services Authority, the benefit of the interim order passed by us on 22.4.2019 should be foregone by the petitioner. Another aspect is that by the order impugned in the writ petition, the petitioner was directed to close down the School.
The stay of operation of the said order in Annexure P-12 will not operate as a licence to continue to run the school for the current academic year. Therefore, interim order passed on 22.04.2019 is liable to be vacated. Accordingly, it is vacated.
::: Downloaded on - 28/09/2019 23:58:36 :::HCHPIt is stated that there are about 240 students and a photograph of the building shows that the Kindergarten School is .
located in a commercial complex. Therefore, in view of the order passed today, the petitioner should take steps to pay back the money collected from the children so that parents of the children can admit them in other schools.
Post after four weeks.
Copy dasti.
( V. Ramasubramanian ) Chief Justice ( Dharam Chand Chaudhary) Judge June 25, 2019 ( vt) ::: Downloaded on - 28/09/2019 23:58:36 :::HCHP