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A.N. PARASURAMAN V. STATE OF TAMIL NADU (1989) 4 SCC 683 : AIR 1990 SC 40

A.N. PARASURAMAN V. STATE OF TAMIL NADU (1989) 4 SCC 683 : AIR 1990 SC 40

 

FACTS

  1. The appellants were interested in running educational institutions, which were covered by the expression “private educational institution” within the meaning of Section 2(f) of the Act.
  2. Section 3 of Tamil Nadu Private Educational Institutions (Regulation) Act, 1966 mandatorily required a private educational institution to obtain the permission of the competent authority for the purpose of running it. Section 4 of the Act required the manager of a private educational institution to make an application for permission in the prescribed form.
  3. The main challenge is directed against Sections 2(c), 3(a), 3(b), 6, 7 read with Sections 15, 22 and 28. The High Court struck down Section 28 and upheld the other sections. That part of the judgment where Section 28 has been declared to be invalid has not been impugned by the respondent-State.
  4. The Act is impugned on the ground that it does not lay down any guideline for the exercise of the power by the delegated authority, as a result of which the authority is in a position to act according to his whims.

 

ISSUE

Whether the Tamil Nadu Private Educational Institutions (Regulation) Act, 1966 is constitutionally valid or not?

 

APPELLANT’S CONTENTIONS

  1. It has been argued that the restrictions put by the Act on the appellants, who are running tutorial institutions, are unreasonable and cannot be justified under sub-clause (g) of Article 19(1) of the Constitution.
  2. The Act is impugned on the ground that it does not lay down any guideline for the exercise of the power by the delegated authority, as a result of which the authority is in a position to act according to his whims.The Act having failed to indicate the conditions for exercise of power, the decision of the competent authority is bound to be discriminatory and arbitrary.
  3. The danger of arbitrariness is enhanced by the unrestricted and unguided discretion vested in the State Government in the choice of “competent authority” defined in Section 2(c).

 

RESPONDENT’S CONTENTIONS

  1. The respondent has attempted to defend the Act on the ground that sufficient guidance is available to the authority concerned from sub-section (2)(c) of Section 4 which enumerates the particulars required to be supplied in the application for permission.
  2. State contended that by reference in Section 4 to the particulars to be supplied in the application for permission, it can be easily imagined that the competent authority has to take into account all that may be validly relevant for the grant or refusal of permission.

 

RATIONALE

  1. The only safeguard given to the applicant institution is to be found in the first proviso to Section 6 which says that the permission shall not be refused unless the applicant has been given an opportunity of making his representation, but that does not by itself protect the applicant from discriminatory treatment.
  2. So far Section 7 dealing with power to cancel the permission granted earlier is concerned, no objection can be taken to the first part of the section. But the other ground on which the authority can exercise its power being contravention “of any direction issued by the competent authority under this Act” again suffers from the vice of arbitrariness.
  3. Section 15, the relevant section in this regard, states that “the competent authority may, from time to time issue such directions regarding the management of a private educational institution as it may think fit” (emphasis added). The section is too wide in terms without indicating the nature of such direction or the extent within which the authority should confine itself while exercising the power.
  4. The provisions of the Act indicate that the State Government has been vested with unrestricted discretion in the matter of the choice of the competent authority under Section 2(c) as also in picking and choosing the institutions for exemption from the Act under Section 22.

  

HELD

The Supreme Court held that the impugned sections of the Act must be held to be invalid. These provisions are inextricably bound up with the other parts of the Act so as to form part of a single scheme, and it is not possible to sever the other parts of the Act and save them. In the result, the entire Act was declared ultra vires. The appeal was accordingly allowed without costs.