Private Universities Regulation: Supreme Court Displeased With Union Not Filing Affidavit Through Cabinet Secretary

In the matter relating to the regulation of private univeristies, the Supreme Court recently (January 8) expressed displeasure over the Union of India filing a compliance affidavit through the Secretary, Department of Higher Education, Ministry of Education, despite a categorical direction that the affidavit must be sworn by the Cabinet Secretary to the Government of India.The Court was monitoring compliance in a matter concerning the regulation of private and deemed-to-be universities across the country, in which States and Union Territories had been directed to furnish comprehensive details regarding their creation, functioning and regulatory oversight.Before a bench comprising Justice Ahsanuddin Amanullah and Justice N. V. Anjaria, Solicitor General Tushar Mehta (for Union and the University Grant Commission) submitted that, unlike the administration in the States, where the Chief Secretary heads the bureaucratic set-up, at the Union level, the Cabinet Secretary, in terms of the working hierarchy, is not in control of the departments. Therefore, the affidavit was filed by the Higher Education Secretary.However, the bench indicated that ignoring a clear judicial direction was not acceptable."We are quite surprised as to how the Cabinet Secretary was under the misconception that despite a categorical Order of this Court to the effect that the affidavit has to be personally affirmed by him as also the fact that we had specifically disallowed any delegation of such filing, UoI's affidavit has, instead, been filed by the Secretary, Department of Higher Education, as noted hereinabove."SG submitted that a request for exemption from filing the Cabinet Secretary's personally-affirmed affidavit has been made in UoI's affidavit. However, the bench remarked that if the Cabinet Secretary had any difficulty, it ought to have moved an application seeking modification of the Court's order. "It goes without saying that if the Cabinet Secretary was in any 'technical' difficulty to file a personally-affirmed affidavit, it was always open to him to make an appropriate prayer in this behalf, however either through his own affidavit or by way of an appropriate application. Neither course of action was adopted by him."It added: "Furthermore, at this juncture, we are unable to understand as to how the Secretary, Department of Higher Education, through his affidavit, could have made any request seeking exemption apropos what was directed to be done personally by the Cabinet Secretary.As stated above, the Cabinet Secretary was very much at liberty to apprise this Court as to whatever he wanted to, however, only by way of his own affidavit. Again, the Cabinet Secretary was also at liberty to prefer an application explaining the administrative/factual set-up/position and pray even for a permanent exemption as also sought permission to delegate future filings to the Secretary concerned."However, without saying anything much, the bench permitted the UOI to revisit the matter to take appropriate steps. It asked UOI to file a fresh additional affidavit duly personally-affirmed by the Secretary of the Ministry of the concerned Department within 2 weeks.Compliance of States/UTsThe Court was informed by Advocate-on-Record Charu Mathur, appearing for the petitioner, that several States had also failed to file their compliance affidavits. States like Assam, Arunachal Pradesh, Haryana, Karnataka, Jharkhand, Manipur, Meghalaya, Punjab, Nagaland, Uttar Pradesh, Tripura, and Sikkim have complied with the orders.States of Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Himachal Pradesh, Kerala, Madhya Pradesh, Odisha, Rajasthan, Goa, Mizoram, Tamil Nadu, Telangana, UT of Puducherry, UT of J & K, and West Bengal have entered appearance, but no affidavit has been filed by them. For this category, the Court issued notice to the concerned Chief Secretaries asking why appropriate action has not been taken and they did not bother to even seek an extension of time to affidavit the respective affidavits.States of Gujarat, Maharashtra, Uttarakhand, UT of Andaman & Nicobar, UT of Dadra and Nagar Haveli and Daman and Diu. NCT of Delhi, UT of Ladakh, UT of Lakshadweep, and UT of Chandigarh have neither entered an appearance nor filed a compliance order.For this category, the Court has issued notice to the concerned Chief Secretaries as to why contempt proceedings should not be issued against them in default of the order. The Court has also directed all parties to file a three-page synopsis of their detailed affidavits, indicating names and number of universities concerned with basic details.The matter is listed for hearing on January 28 at 3 pm.BackgroundLast year, the Supreme Court had expressed its intent to undertake a broader examination of the functioning of private universities nationwide. In furtherance of this, the Bench had issued directions in public interest requiring the Cabinet Secretary and Chief Secretaries of all States and Union Territories to...

Private Universities Regulation: Supreme Court Displeased With Union Not Filing Affidavit Through Cabinet Secretary

Gursimran Kaur Bakshi

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