MARITIME INSTITUTE ASSOCIATION Vs. INDIAN MARITIME UNIVERSITY

JUDGEMENT

(1.) BY way of this Public Interest writ petition, the petitioner claiming to be an Association of Maritime Institutes called the Maritime Institutes Association, said to be registered under the provisions of the Tamil Nadu, 1975, Has sought for issuance of a writ of certiorarified mandamus to quash the notification issued by the first respondent University, a Central University, publishing the Admission and Application details for the year 2010, for admission to the three year B.Sc. (Nautical) degree course and Diploma in Nautical Science (DNS) and to quash paragraph No. 5 relating to the programme duration insofar it enables sponsoring companies to interfere in the admission of students, Clause 14 relating to allotment of seats by the first respondent University without counselling is completed in the first round and to quash the counselling details shown in Annexure-I insofar it includes respondents 4 to 10 from participating in the regular counselling and to direct the first respondent University to admit the students on the basis of the merit ranking and complete the process of counseling in a fair and transparent manner by the first respondent University.

(2.) THE sum and substance of the grievance of the petitioner is that the first respondent University in order to favour respondents 4 to 10 has given unfettered discretion to them and introduced certain clauses in the admission notification giving them wide powers and these clauses are to be set aside. In support of this contention, certain factual averments have been pleaded in the affidavits.

(3.) ON the merits of the claims made by the writ petitioner, the first respondent University has filed an elaborate counter. As the preliminary objection has been raised, at the first instance, we propose the examine the same and on being satisfied, the merits could be gone into at a later stage.