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2014 (9) TMI 1054 - HC - Indian LawsWithdrawal of approval status of Institute - All India Council for Technical Education (for short 'AICTE') decided to place the petitioner-institute under "withdrawal of approval status" for 2014-15 and requested the Principal Secretary (Higher and Technical Education) Delhi and also Registrar, GGSIP University to shift affected students of the institute to other AICTE approved institutes affiliated to their University in consultation with the State Government - Held that:- Reliance of petitioners on University's inspection report dated 16th June, 2014 is misplaced as AICTE has taken a decision in accordance with the procedure prescribed in its regulations and the same did not contemplate inspection by an affiliating university. It is to be noted that the respondent- University before this Court has admitted that its inspection was purely an annual exercise to evaluate academic standards and teaching methods at the institute and not for evaluating the infrastructure and other physical parameters pertaining to the respective institutes. Thus, the University's inspection report cannot be taken into account while deciding the issue of grant of approval to petitioners. The contention of petitioner regarding deficiencies in the case of Amity School of Engineering and Technology cannot be adjudicated upon in view of its non-impleadment. It is to be noted that it is AICTE's case that while Amity college was granted permission on self assessment basis, petitioner's application was rejected after the Expert Visiting Committee inspected petitioners' premises in accordance with the procedure prescribed under Clause 11 of Chapter IV of AICTE Approval Process Handbook. Moreover, the equality concept in Article 14 of the Constitution is a positive concept and petitioners cannot claim parity for continuing a deficiency. In a catena of judgements it has been held that negative equality is not a valid legal ground. From the aforesaid facts, it is apparent that the petitioner-institute suffers from several deficiencies pointed out by the Expert Visiting Committee. Despite various notices issued by AICTE to petitioner-institute to shift to a permanent site, it has been conducting engineering course from temporary premises for more than fifteen years. While it is true that the time to shift premises has been extended till 31st December, 2014, yet this Court finds that no steps have been taken by petitioners for shifting their college to a permanent site. After all a building cannot be constructed overnight! Consequently, this Court of the view that the impugned order dated 24th June, 2014 suffers from no illegality, irregularity and/or procedural impropriety. Accordingly, the writ petition as well as applications are dismissed and the interim order dated 3rd July, 2014 is vacated.
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