SHEELA BARSE Vs. SECRETARY CHILDRENS AID SOCIETY

JUDGEMENT

(1.) In this appeal by special leave the appellant who is a free lance journalist by profession and a Member of the Maharashtra State Legal Aid and Advice Committee, seeks to challenge the judgment of the Bombay High Court delivered on 4th February, 1985 on a writ petition filed by her.

(2.) In the writ petition she made grievance about the working of the New Observation Home located at Mankhurd which is maintained and managed by the Children's Aid Society, Bombay. According to her, the Children's Aid Society is registered under the Societies Registration Act, 1860, and has also been treated as a Public Trust under the Bombay Public Trusts Act of 1950. The Society was founded on 1st May, 1926. The Chief Minister of Maharashtra State is the ex officio President and the Minister for Social Welfare is the Vice-President of the Governing Council of the Society. The said Society receives grants from the State. It has set up a Remand Home at Umerkhadi within Bombay area and it is now run as an Observation Home under the provisions of the Bombay Children Act, 1948 (hereinafter referred to as 'the Act'). The Society runs three observation homes - one at Umerkhadi established in 1927, the second at Mankhurd established in 1960 and the third, the New Observation Home also at Mankhurd. The appellant's letter of 22nd August, 1984 was treated as a writ petition by the High Court wherein the grievances made by the petitioner were of four types as set out by the High Court in para 23 of its judgment

(3.) The Society appeard before the High Court and filed counter-affidavits denying allegations of facts raised in the writ petition and both parties produced documents. The High Court went into the matter at considerable length, found some of the allegations to be without any justification and yet others were accepted. In paras 44 and 45 of the impugned judgment, the High Court colated its directions and recommended thus :