ASHUTOSH SINGH Vs. UNIVERSITY OF DELHI

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The present writ petition under Article 226 of the Constitution of India has been preferred by a student belonging to the Non Creamy Layer of the Other Backward Castes being aggrieved by the respondent/University's action in rejecting his candidature in the 'Spot Admission' round held on 31/12/2021 for the 2-year/3-year LL.M programme for the academic session 2021-22 on account of the caste certificate, submitted by him alongwith his application not being of the current financial year without giving him anytime to submit the requisite certificate.

(2.) The petitioner, after acquiring his LLB degree from the respondent University, applied for admission to the 2-year/3-year LLM programme in the respondent University under the OBC category. As per the Admission Bulletin (hereinafter referred to as 'the bulletin'), issued by the respondent for Post Graduate programmes, 2021-2022; the students were, for applying under the OBC category, required to furnish an OBC Non-Creamy Layer Certificate (hereinafter referred to as the 'OBC-NCL certificate') for the financial year 2021-22 as issued after 31/3/2021. The bulletin however, contained a provision enabling students in the OBC category, who were not in possession of an OBC-NCL certificate for the financial year 2021-22 as issued after 31/3/2021, to apply for admission by uploading either the earlier OBC-NCL certificate or the acknowledgement slip of having applied for issuance of an OBC-NCL certificate for 2021-22, subject to their producing the requisite OBC-NCL certificate for 2021-22 at the time of admission.

(3.) Since the petitioner was already possessing an OBC-NCL certificate dtd. 15/7/2018 issued by the Government of Uttar Pradesh, he, while submitting his application for LLM uploaded a copy of this certificate dtd. 15/7/2018. Based on his registration as an OBC candidate, the petitioner on 28/9/2021, appeared in the Delhi University Entrance Test, 2021 (hereinafter referred to as the 'DUET 2021') for admission to the LLM programme in which entrance test, he scored 180 marks out of a total of 400.