BISWAJIT DEBA SHARMA Vs. STATE OF ARUNACHAL PRADESH

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The legitimacy of the orders cancelling the admission of the petitioners in the respective institutions is the subject-matter of all these five writ petitions. Since the factual aspects as well as the legal aspects involved in the writ petitions are of the same nature, all these matters, therefore, are taken-up for hearing together for the purposes of adjudication of these cases.

(2.) The facts and circumstances leading to the institution of these cases are discussed hereinbelow. In the State-in-question, viz., the State of Arunachal Pradesh, there is no technical institution. Each year, certain quota of seats in the various technical institutions in the country are earmarked for the students from the different States by the Govt. of India, Ministry of Human Resource Development, for allotment to the different States. For the State of Arunachal Pradesh also, the Central Government allotted certain number of seats in the various institutions. For that purpose, the State of Arunachal Pradesh conducted a Joiint Entrance Examination for different categories of candidates which are indicated bellow: Category I: Arunachal Pradesh Scheduled Tribe which also includes AlS/Central Govt./ State Govt. employees belonging to APST. Category II : Sons and daughters only of Non-APST State Govt. employees. Category III: Sons and daughters only of Central Govt. employees serving within the territory of Arunachal Pradesh. Category IV : All residual persons not included in any of the above three categories. The State Government formulated guidelines accordingly defining/prescribing, amongst others, the eligibility criteria for the candidates. The petitioners appeared in the Joint Entrance Examination for the year 1998 and the name of the qualifying candidates were published. Some complaints were made from different quarters regarding the anomalies in the nomination of the candidates. The State Government attended to those complaints and ordered the Chief Secretary to conduct an enquiry. The Chief Secretary found those complaints to be genuine and accordingly, ordered for cancellation of the names of those persons/candidates who were placed below in the merit list. The allotment of seats against those persons were also cancelled by separate orders and again persons/candidates were nominated as per the merit lisi Sequel to the above exercise, the present petitioners were admitted in various institutions on the strength of different Government orders. One such order issued in favour of the petitioner in writ petition (c) No. 323/99 read as follows:

(3.) The State Government did not file any affidavit. However, from the comments submitted to the learned Govt. Advocate for the State of Arunachal Pradesh by the State/respondents, it is apparent that the respondents admitted that the private respondents who were nominated by the State Government, were nominated irregularly and not on merits and for the said irregularities, the State Government has initiated disciplinary actions against the concerned officers/ authorities. The concerned competent authority has intimated that the Government has examined the irregularities in allotment/ nomination of seats to students in various institutions outside the State from different angles and finally viewed that there might be possibility of losing the seats if the said irregularities are sought to be rectified since some of the States where to candidates were nominated for undergoing various courses have refused to admit the such students due to late nomination by the Government. Besides, the candidates who were already nominated would also suffer financially and otherwise and, therefore, the Government decided that the candidates who were sponsored on irregular basis, be allowed to continue with their studies. The Government accordingly issued the following order to the Director of Technical Education of the concerned State pertaining to cancellation of admission of nominees of the Government of Arunachal Pradesh: