Karnataka High Court: S. Sujatha, J. while preserving the right of the petitioner disposed of this petition.
In the instant case, the petitioner-institution is an Engineering College and was established by permission granted by AICTE and the State Government. It is affiliated by Visvesvaraya Technological University (Respondent 4). In the academic year 2019-2020, a team from the University visited the petitioner’s premises and found some deficiencies in the working of the college thereby, issuing a show-cause notice and finally a communication was issued to the Department of Higher Education, State of Karnataka (Respondent 1) to remove the name of the petitioner from the seat matrix and to show that no courses would be offered during the counseling process. The petitioner assailed the aforesaid communication.
Counsel for the petitioner, Abhishek Malipatil submitted that the impugned communication is ex-facie illegal and in violation of principles of Natural Justice as the order was passed before hearing the petitioner. It was further submitted that the petitioner is permitted by the AICTE to run the college, therefore, the University cannot deny affiliation on insubstantial grounds. The Institution imparts education in the rural areas which mainly depends on the Government quota seats. This communication since issued in the mid of the counseling process has adversely affected the petitioner-Institution.
Counsel for Respondent 4, Santhosh S. Nagarale submitted that since the petitioner did not cooperate with the Visiting Team from the University, the Communication had to be issued. It was further submitted that the Team shall visit and inspect the Institution if the petitioner-Institution agrees to bear the expenses and compliance of the deficiencies pointed out before.
The Court after observing the submissions directed Respondent 4 to carry out the inspection on the expense borne by the petitioner-Institution. After submission of the compliance report by the petitioner, a decision shall be taken on the extension of the affiliation within ten days of this order.[Eklavaya Institute of Technology v. State of Karnataka, 2019 SCC OnLine Kar 879, decided on 02-07-2019]
