Kerala High Court: A Division Bench of CJ Hrishikesh Roy and A.K. Jayashankaran Nambiar, J. opined that the students could not be compelled to continue in a college which according to their perception was detrimental to their career and laid that there was no reason to interfere with the judgment of the single Judge whereby students were allowed the inter-college transfer.
Respondent student sought inter-collegiate transfer from the Cochin Institute of Science and Technology to another self-financing college under the same university since the amenities and infrastructure in his college were inadequate. But the college principal did not accord permission for the inter-college transfer. Thus, the respondent herein had filed a petition before this Court and a Single Judge Bench[1] allowed the same holding that college could not arbitrarily reject issuance of NOC to students desirous of taking admission into another college/ institute. Aggrieved by the said decision, the appellant-college preferred the instant appeal.
The counsel for the appellant, Anoop V. Nair and M.S. Sandeep Sudhakaran contended that if such inter-college transfer was permitted, the functioning of the appellant college would itself be put to jeopardy as it might possibly adversely impact those opting to continue in the Cochin Institute of Science and Technology.
The Court relied on the judgment of Supreme Court in the case of K.S. Puttaswamy v. Union of India, (2017) 10 SCC 1, in which it was held that the right of a person to individual autonomy was matter of personal choice and preferences were integral to his dignity and thereby it was his fundamental right under Article 21 of the Constitution of India. It remarked that “freedom to choose the college of his/her choice for pursuit of their studies is according to us, an aspect of the Fundamental Right to privacy, guaranteed under Article 21 of the Constitution.”
The Court held that the appellants had not been able to show any condition either statutory or contractual which obliged a student admitted to their college to necessarily continue their course of study in the same institution and therefore when a student felt that he could secure better education in another college and there was no legal bar in exercise of such option, appellants could not compel the students to continue their curriculum from the same college. Hence, the Court dismissed the appeals for being devoid of merit.[Cochin Institute of Science and Technology v. Jisin Jijo, 2019 SCC OnLine Ker 1800, decided on 04-06-2019]
[1] https://blog.scconline.com/post/2019/06/12/ker-hc-college-cannot-arbitrarily-reject-issuance-of-noc-to-students-desirous-of-taking-admission-into-another-college-institute/