ODISHA MANAGEMENT COLLEGES ASSOCIATION Vs. STATE OF ODISHA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE writ petition has been filed with a prayer to issue a writ in the nature of mandamus or any other appropriate writ/writs, order/ orders, direction/directions directing the opposite parties, particularly, opposite party No.1-State of Odisha, represented through its Commissioner-cum-Secretary, Employment, Technical Education and Training Department, Odisha, Bhubaneswar and opposite party No.2- Chairman, Odisha Joint Entrance Examination, OJEE Cell, Gandamunda, Khandagiri, Bhubaneswar, Khurda to allow the members of the petitioner- association to give admission to the students in five years dual Management Degree, i.e., Master in Applied Management (MAM) course for the session 2013-14 in respect of the seats approved by the AICTE.

(2.) IN course of hearing, Mr. B. Routray, learned Senior Advocate appearing for the petitioner confined his argument to the second prayer and did not press the first prayer.

(3.) MR . S. Palit, learned counsel for opposite party No.2-OJEE submitted that the Hon'ble Supreme Court in the case of T.M. Pai Foundation vs. State of Kerala, (2002) 8 SCC 481 laid down the principles that the admission and its procedure is to be fair, transparent and non- exploitative. The State can provide a procedure for holding a Common Entrance Test in the interest of securing fair and merit ­ based admission and preventing mal-administration. In support of his above contentions, Mr. Palit also relied upon the decision of the Hon'ble Supreme Court in the case of P.A. Inamdar vs. State of Maharashtra, (2005) 6 SCC 537 and Orissa Professional Educational Institutions (Regulation of Admission and Fixation of Fee) Act, 2007 (for short, "Act, 2007"). Mr Palit submitted that the Act, 2007 also includes Masters Degree in Management course. Referring to Sections 3 and 11 of the Act, 2007, it was submitted that the single window system means centralized system for admission administered by the Policy Planning Body. "JEE" means entrance test conducted by the Policy Planning Body for all professional educational institutions for determination of merit of the candidates followed by centralized counseling for the purpose of admission to such institutions through a single window system. Admission made in violation of the provisions of the Act, 2007 and Rules framed thereunder shall be invalid. Clause 11.4(b) of the AICTE Approval Process Hand Book has been harmoniously construed in the OJEE brochure with law laid down by the Hon'ble Supreme Court. Separate merit list means the merit list prepared by the JEE in the three streams i.e., Science, Commerce and Arts. OJEE ranking is a pre-requisite. The AICTE has never said that it is only basing on marks, because the three streams have different subjects, different syllabuses and different combination of papers. Merit cannot be evaluated unless a Common Entrance Test is conducted to prepare a separate merit list for the different streams concerned so as to carve out a procedure for admission from different streams. The petitioner has mis-interpreted the said clause only to mislead this Court. The petitioner-association has filed this writ petition at a belated stage. Therefore, they are not entitled to any relief as prayed for in this writ petition.