GSVS ASSOCIATION Vs. STATE OF KARNATAKA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) By an order dated 12th of October 1994, the 3rd respondent-Director of Vocational Education permitted the petitioner's Pre-University College to start an additional Vocational Course in Nursing. The permission granted was restricted to the academic year 1994- 95. The petitioner appears to have started the said additional course and while the same was in progress, the Government by its order dated 29th of January 1996 cancelled the permission granted. Similar permissions granted to run courses in Pharmacy and Dental Technicians were also cancelled primarily on the ground that the courses were allowed to be started without the permission of the statutory authorities concerned. Aggrieved, the petitioner has filed the present Writ Petition assailing the cancellation inter alia on the ground that the course having been started pursuant to the permission granted by the Government by its order dated 11th of October 1994, the same could not have been cancelled simply because the Pharmacy Council of India had objected to a Vocational Course in Pharmacy being offered by Vocational Institutes without its permission.

(2.) In the statement of objections filed by the respondents, it is pointed out that the Central Government has under a Scheme formulated by it sponsored vocationalisation of secondary education. The said Scheme was initially applicable only to Technical, Agricultural and Commerce based trades, but was extended to para-Medical Courses also including Nursing, Pharmacy and Laboratory Technicians. The Scheme, it appears, envisages financial grants for the institutions offering the same. Such a grant was sanctioned in favour of the petitioner also for the Nursing Course started by it. It is further pointed out that the Pharmacy Council of India had objected to the conduct of Vocational Courses contrary to the provisions of the Pharmacy Act and asked the State Government to take steps to rectify the said violation. The Council, it appears, had threatened not to recognise any such course particularly when the same was undertaken by persons, who did not possess the minimum qualifications prescribed therefor. The objections raised by the Pharmacy Council were examined by the State Government, which revealed that the Vocational Courses in Pharmacy, Nursing and Dental Technology were governed by specific enactments on the subject regulating the grant of permission to institutions offering such courses. Consequently the permissions granted were cancelled and the institutes asked to stop the Courses in view of the fact that they were not approved by the concerned statutory bodies. The petitioners' institute, it is urged, not being approved by the State Nursing Council under Section 23 of the Karnataka Nurses, Midwives and Health Visitors Act, 1961 was not entitled to continue the course which it was permitted to start only for the year 1994-95. The impugned order has thus been stoutly defended by the respondents both on principle as also on the ground that the permission granted to the petitioner was limited only to one academic year and there being no permission for the petitioner for the year 1996 onwards, the question of its continuing to offer any such course did not arise.

(3.) The Karnataka Nurses, Mid-wives and Health Visitors Act, 1961 (hereinafter referred to as the Act) envisages the establishment, incorporation and constitution of a Council called the Karnataka Nursing Council. Section 18 of the Act forbids any person from practising or holding himself out, whether directly or by implication, as practising habitually or for personal gain as a nurse, midwife, auxiliary nurse-midwife or healt visitor, except after getting himself enlisted in terms of Section 17 thereof. Section 23 of the Act relates to training institutions and provides that institutes which are approved and recognised by the Council after inspection by its representative shall be competent to train nurses, midwives, auxiliary nurse-midwives or health visitors and to send them for examination for the qualifying certificate of the Council. Sub-section (3) of Section 23 contains a prohibition against any School, Hospital or other Institution which is not approved and recognised under the said Section issuing to any person a certificate or entering the name of any person in any document purporting to show that such person is qualified by reason of his having passed any examination or undergone any course of training to practice as a nurse, midwife, auxiliary nurse midwife or health visitor, Section 23(4) makes the contravention of Sub-section (3) punishable with fine extending upto Rs. 300/-.