SRI. GANAPATHI VIDYA SAMSTHE (R) ITS BY SECRETARY Vs. THE STATE OF KARNATAKA BY ITS SECRETARY TO GOVERNMENT, PRIMARY AND SECONDARY EDUCATION AND ORS.

JUDGEMENT

(1.) HEARD the learned Counsel for the petitioner and the learned Government Advocate. It is the case of the petitioner that the petitioner is a Society registered as Shri Ganapathi High School Committee, Hebbur in the year 1954 under the provisions of the Mysore Societies Registration Act, 1904 (Hereinafter referred to as the '1904 Act', for brevity). The name of the petitioner was changed as Shri Ganapathi Vidya Samsthe (Shri Ganapathi Education Society) in the year 2001, which was duly accepted by the Registrar of Societies. The accounts of the Society are audited up to date and the returns are filed regularly with the Registrar of Societies. The Society was desirous of establishing and running a High School at Hebbur and accordingly a decision had been taken in the year 1950, to establish a school premises. Accordingly, a request was made to the Village Panchayath for allotment of land and it is in this background that a gift deed was said to have been executed as on 30.12.1950, as at Annexure -H, pursuant to the resolution at Annexure -G. The school was run uninterruptedly over the decades.

(2.) THE State Government has entered appearance and filed statement of objections, to contend that though it is seen from the records that the petitioner is a society registered under the 1904 Act and that it had changed its name to Ganapathi Vidya Samsthe, insofar as the gift deed, under which the petitioner claims title, is an unregistered document and therefore, there is no title that could pass under the same and it is seriously disputed that there was ever gift made in favour of the petitioner. Insofar as the suit filed for injunction is concerned, the respondents were restrained from demolishing the buildings and it. is having regard to the finding as to the irregularities insofar as the establishment of the institutions itself, that' further action has been taken.

(3.) Given the above facts and circumstances, it is not 111 serious dispute that the institution has been in existence since the year 1950. It is only in the recent past that inquiries have been initiated as to the claim of the State Government that the land and building, on which the institutions are being run, actually belonged to the Government. This is an aspect which is capable of being addressed, without reference to the institutions that are actually run and the action on the part of respondent No. 2 in having initiated directions to respondent No. 1 to withdraw the recognition and permission as well as the grant -in -aid is a knee -jerk reaction in proceeding on the basis that the land and buildings actually belonged to the Government and have been encroached by the petitioner, at this point of time.