KULDEEP KUMAR Vs. UNION OF INDIA AND OTHERS

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The petitioner seeks the release of scholarship as per the conditions of the All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) under the GATE quota for M.Tech. (Computer Science & Engineering) for the Session 2008-2010, along with the interest till the date of payment.

(2.) It is the pleaded case of the petitioner that he had passed his B.Tech (Computer Science & Engineering) examination in the year 2007. Thereafter, he participated in the Graduate Aptitude Test in Engineering (GATE) in the year 2007 and scored a rank of 219 with all India Rank of 6186. He belongs to Scheduled Caste Category and had taken admission in M.Tech with the respondent No.3-University in the year 2008 and deposited the full admission fees and passed out in the year 2010. He was entitled to receive his scholarship @ Rs.8,000.00 per month for those 24 months, as per the letter dated 29.07.2015 (Annexure P-6) under the Right to Information Act, 2005. It is the case of the petitioner that his father is a low paid employee in the Haryana Government and had curtailed his family's necessities to meet the expenses of study of his son. The requests for the release of the same were denied on the ground that the respondent No.2 (AICTE) was not releasing his scholarship for the session 2008-2010. Repeated representations were made and the University also made a request to respondent No.2 on 16.05.2013 (Annexure P-8) to release the scholarship of the petitioner. A legal notice was also served upon the respondents on 18.03.2015 (Annexure P-9) forwarded with a reminder on 13.05.2015, but of no avail. The University had sent a reply that the scholarship would be released when the respondent No.2 would give the scholarship. Vide letter dated 07.04.2015 (Annexure P-10) respondent No.2 replied to the legal notice taking the plea that there was no approval to the respondent-University for the academic session 2008-2010 to run the course of M.Tech (CSE).

(3.) The Vice-Chancellor of the University had written to the respondent No.2 to give accord approval in its name instead of in the name of Post Graduate Regional Centre at Hisar, vide letter dated 15.05.2009 (Annexure P-12). It was on this account that the petitioner had been deprived the scholarship, since there was a transfer of the course from Kurukshetra University to the respondent-University, in view of the Sec. 35 of the Act pertaining to the respondent No.3-University.