COMMITTEE OF MANAGEMENT Vs. STATE OF U P

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE petitioner is stated to have established an Institution in the year 2007. The institution at the relevant time was not granted any recognition. It continued to be purely a private institution. With the passing of The Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act, 2009, the petitioner is stated to have made an application for grant of recognition under the said U.P. Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Rules of 2011 for the first time in June, 2011. Since the application of the petitioner was not being considered, he filed civil misc. writ petition No. 50153 of 2012. which was disposed of by this Court vide order dated 27.9.2012 with the observation that the application of the petitioner may be considered in accordance with the Act of 2009 and the rules framed thereunder. The District Basic Education Officer, Aligarh vide order dated 17.11.2012 has rejected the application of the petitioner for grant of recognition after noticing six discrepancies in the institution (page 32 of the present writ petition). It has been recorded that the institution does not have separate washroom girl/boy students as well as for teachers and out of five teachers said to be working in the institution, three are untrained. The institution is being run in a rented premises and it does not have sufficient accommodation for running of recognised institution and lastly that the total number of students admitted In Class -VIII is only 37, which is much below than that prescribed.

(2.) LEARNED counsel for the petitioner contends that the order impugned is bad for following reasons (a) that the Basic Education Officer. Aligarh himself has recorded that the recognition under the Rules of 2011 is to be granted on the recommendation of three member Committee as per the Government Order dated 19.5.2011 of which the District Basic Education Officer is a member Secretary and that without approval of the Committee as aforesaid, no recognition can be granted by the District Basic Education Officer. He, therefore, submits that the order of the District Basic Education Officer in absence of the recommendation of the Committee is bad. In respect of the deficiency as noted above, he points out that under Section 19 of the Act of 2009 makes a provision for grant of three years time to the Institutions, which are already in existence for satisfying the requirement of the Act within a period of three years from the date of such commencement to" remove the deficiencies, in respect of teachers reference is made to sub -section (2) of Section 23 of the Act of 2009, which provides that the teachers already employed will acquire requisite qualifications within a period of five years of the notification. He, therefore, submits that the order impugned even otherwise is not sustainable in the eyes of law.

(3.) IN my opinion, the petitioner had made an application for grant of recognition with the enforcement of The Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act, 2009 and the Rules, 2011. Up to the relevant period, the petitioner institution had no recognition from any statutory body. The said recognition is being asked for by the petitioner for the first time under the Right to Information Act and the Rules of 2011. The application of the petitioner has to be processed in accordance with the Rules of 2011 framed by the State of U.P. in exercise of power under Section 38 of the Act of 2009. The State Government has taken a policy decision in the matter of grant of new recognition as per Rule 11 of the Rules of 2011, which specifically provides that the Zila Shiksha Adhikari shall conduct a site inspection of each school and shall satisfy whether it fulfils the norms and standards under the conditions mentioned in sub -rule (1) within three months of the receipt of the self declaration. The report is to be considered and it is only on confirmation of the norms, standards and the conditions specified that the District Basic Education Officer can grant recognition.