Aligarh Muslim University Case | Historic Antecedents Of Institute Must Be Seen To Assess Minority Status, AMU Tells Supreme Court [Day 1]

The Supreme Court's Constitution Bench of 7 judges headed by the Chief Justice of India, DY Chandrachud on Tuesday (January 9) began the hearing of a batch of connected matters on the issue of minority status of the Aligarh Muslim University (AMU). The Bench comprising the CJI and Justices Sanjiv Khanna, Surya Kant, JB Pardiwala, Dipankar Datta, Manoj Misra and SC Sharma is dealing with a challenge to a 2006 decision of the Allahabad High Court which held that though AMU was established by a minority community, it was never administered or claimed to be administered by the same and thus cannot be considered as a minority institution. Senior Advocate Dr Rajeev Dhavan opened the arguments on the AMU. During the hearing, the bench asked if a University established by a statute (the AMU Act 1920) can be held to be a minority institution as per Article 30.Justice Khanna posed a question to petitioners “Just one thing, since you are arguing with respect to AMU, what will be the position post the enactment and enforcement of the constitution? " Explaining to the bench, Mr Dhavan said that a large number of deemed universities under the UGC are declared to be minority institutions despite the decision in Azeez Basha v. UOI. He stated “ Therefore we are required to see it from the constitutional lens and liberal education has to be combined with religious education.” Key Issues Raised : The present constitutional bench was referred to the matter by an earlier order of the CJI Ranjan Gogoi in 2019 when hearing the appeal against the 2006 judgement of the Allahabad High Court. The minority status of AMU was originally dealt with in the case of S. Azeez Basha vs. Union Of India in 1967. The bench led by former Chief Justice KN Wanchoo concluded that Aligarh Muslim University was not founded or managed by the Muslim minority. TAdditionally, the bench determined that Aligarh Muslim University does not qualify as a minority institution. Citing the case to be one of reconsideration before the court, senior advocate Dhavan stated that the main question of reference would be whether the “decision in Azeez basha is internally contradictory on the reasoning on facts and law, contrary to the decisions of this court render nugatory by subsequent statutory changes and contrary to the constitutional dispensation of article 30?” Thus the main issues were divided further into 5 parts: (1) Whether Basha was correctly decided; (2) What is the effect of the National Commission of Minority Education Institutions Act read with the UGC Act; (3) Should Basha be reconsidered in light of the NCMIE Act and read with the UGC Act; (4) Was Basha correct in accepting the antecedents's historical data on AMU's Muslim character but denying its constitutional significance while deciding the issue of minority status and (5) Is Basha contrary to the constitutional dispensation?. Another aspect highlighted by Dhavan was the essence and meaning of minority under Article 30. Submitting that Articles 25 and 30 of the constitution are “the crux of understanding of what has to be done in this multi-diverse country”, the counsel elaborates on two concepts of secularism: “ The first comes from 25 (2)(a) and this is the negative view, saying a narrow view, the wider view is what we understand as part of the basic structure. Now coming to article 30, all minorities whether based on religion or language what is a minority is anterior to this, establish and administer are the rights that flow from the recognition of minority, it's important that your lordships may settle it, what is it that makes a minority, the 3 questions in my mind are the origin, the second is of nexus - whether they found the institution or not and thirdly is on the issue of numerical test” Article 30 of the Constitution provides rights to minorities to establish and administer educational institutions. Article 30(1) Provides minorities either on the basis of religion or language the right to establish and administer educational institutions of their choice. Consequently, Article 30(2) in granting aid to educational institutions, prohibits the state from discriminating against any such minority institution based on religion or language. 'Contradictions' in Azeez Basha v. UOI : Underpinning his concerns with the decision of the Supreme Court in Basha, Mr Dhavan submitted 4 facets - firstly, the judgement says that universities can be a minority; secondly, in the judgment, the antecedent history and role of Muhammandan Anglo-Oriental College (MAO) in building the institution and holds that “It is clearly Muslim”; thirdly, the Court in doing so completely ignores the purpose of the AMU Act 1920 ( the establishing Act of the University); fourthly, the judgement ignores the alternative meanings to 'Establish' and misplaces the importance of 'Recognition'. As per the petitioners, while on one hand the Court in its decision in Basha correctly...

Aligarh Muslim University Case | Historic Antecedents Of Institute Must Be Seen To Assess Minority Status, AMU Tells Supreme Court [Day 1]

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