Punjab-Haryana High Court
Sarthik Education Trust And Anr vs State Of Haryana And Ors on 24 September, 2014
Author: K. Kannan
Bench: K. Kannan
CWP No. 19464 of 2014 1
IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB AND HARYANA AT
CHANDIGARH
CWP No. 19464 of 2014 (O&M)
Date of decision: September 24, 2014.
Sarthik Education Trust (Regd.) NITC, Nasirpur and another
...Petitioners
Versus
State of Haryana and another
...Respondents
CORAM:- HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE K. KANNAN
1. Whether Reporters of local papers may be allowed to see the judgment ?
2. To be referred to the Reporters or not ?
3. Whether the judgment should be reported in the Digest?
Present: Mr. DS Patwalia, Senior Advocate with
Mr. Salil Sabhlok, Advocate, for
for the petitioners.
Mr. Roopak Bansal, Additional Advocate General, Haryana.
K. KANNAN, J. (Oral)
1. The written statement filed on behalf of respondents No. 1 and 2 is taken on record.
2. The petitioners-trust is before the court aggrieved by the decision not to grant the petitioners the permission to start two units of the new trade in Diesel Mechanic in the Institute which the petitioners-trust is running. The application for starting the new trade had been submitted on 23.10.2013 (Annexure P/1) and when there was no consideration of the same, a reminder had been subsequently submitted on 23.5.2014 (Annexure P/2). This had been returned by the Director General of the Industrial PREM SINGH 2014.09.24 17:37 I attest to the accuracy and integrity of this document Chandigarh CWP No. 19464 of 2014 2 Training Department, stating that the trade must be affiliated to the National Council of Vocational Training (NCVT) and that the petitioners would require such affiliation to be secured before applying for a new trade. It was evidently a mistake on the part of the respondents in failing to note that the affiliation had been actually secured under the NCVT and the same was communicated to the respondents along with the affidavit on 23.5.2014.
3. The necessary formalities of inspection still remained and when on the first inspection some discrepancies were found and reported to the petitioners, a re-inspection had been done and admittedly there exists no discrepancies as per the reply filed by the respondents. However, the impugned order was passed on 12.9.2014 denying the petitioners the benefit of the inspection and compliance of all the formalities. This communication does not give any reason for cancellation, though the earlier communication received on 7.8.2014 revealed that in terms of the new policy dated 16.7.2014 issued by the Government, the time for making request for new trade had already expired in November, 2013.
4. The learned Senior Counsel appearing for the petitioners has an objection that a new policy introduced on 16.7.2014 cannot apply to an application, which is already filed and pending. In any event, the application for new trade had been made on 23.10.2013 itself and for no fault of the petitioners, the respondents did not carry out any inspection till August, 2014 and admittedly when the discrepancies had also been found removed, the permission ought to have been granted. The petitioners would also cite an instance of yet another institute called Wonder Valley at Karnal which PREM SINGH 2014.09.24 17:37 I attest to the accuracy and integrity of this document Chandigarh CWP No. 19464 of 2014 3 had applied for permission in the month of August, 2014 and the permission had been granted by the respondents. The petitioners could not be discriminated without any justification.
5. The factual details of what have been brought out in the petition have not been denied, but the justification which is made for the impugned orders is on a plea that the petitioners-institute was not covered under the new government policy regarding increase of units/trade under the State Council for Vocational Training Scheme (SCVT) and hence the demand draft for inspection that had been sent had also been returned. It was also brought out in the reply that the last date for admission fixed by the Director General of Employment and Training was 15.9.2014 for NCVT admission at the national level and that period has also expired.
6. The petitioners would explain that the last date for receiving of applications for admission was 15.9.2014 but the last date for forwarding the applications to the Director fell on 30.9.2014 and the petitioners would take the risk of even making the advertisement for receiving the applications but would conform to the last date for submission of the filled in applications to the Director before the deadline, namely, 30.9.2014.
7. I find that the new policy fixing a date for making the applications for commencement of a course for a academic session before November of the previous year cannot actually be applied to the petitioners, for, it could only be prospective. Even if it were to be taken that it could be made retroactive, I must observe that the application filed on 23.10.2013 alone must be taken the date as when the application for commencement of PREM SINGH 2014.09.24 17:37 I attest to the accuracy and integrity of this document Chandigarh CWP No. 19464 of 2014 4 the trade had been made and not the date when it was re-submitted in June, 2014 when such re-submission became necessary only on account of the wrong assumption that the petitioners-institute did not have NCVT affiliation. The re-submission must be taken as having been required to be made, not on account of any mistake on the part of the petitioners, since affiliation for NCVT already existed even at the time when the application was made in October, 2013. Applying the new policy or not, the result ought to be the same that the application for new trade had been submitted even before the cut off period as spelt out in the new policy.
8. If there has been any occasion for a delay for receipt of admission forms, it is only to ensure that there is sufficient time for the students to respond and for the institute to gather applications and to forward to the Director before 30.9.2014. If the petitioners-institute is prepared to curtail its own time limit to receive the filled in application forms but would commit no breach in submission of the application forms to the Director before the date already fixed, namely, 30.9.2014, there cannot be any objection from the State. The last date as 15.9.2014 for receipt of the applications was only for the benefit of the students and if the institute is prepared to take a risk of allowing itself a shorter period to forward the filled in applications before the final date, the petitioners should have such benefit in the manner in which it is prepared to undertake the risk.
9. Under the circumstances, I hold that the rejection of the petitioners' request, as carried through the impugned orders Annexures P/11 and P/12 cannot be sustained. The 2nd respondent is directed to accord to the PREM SINGH 2014.09.24 17:37 I attest to the accuracy and integrity of this document Chandigarh CWP No. 19464 of 2014 5 petitioners the permission for commencement of the new trade and relieve the petitioners of receipt of application forms for admission before 15.9.2014 but would require to make no concession for filled in applications form before 30.9.2014, as already notified.
10. The writ petition is allowed in the above terms.
September 24, 2014 (K.KANNAN)
prem JUDGE
PREM SINGH
2014.09.24 17:37
I attest to the accuracy and
integrity of this document
Chandigarh