Ram Rampur Girish Chandra Junior ... vs The State Of West Bengal & Ors
2023 Latest Caselaw 2685 Cal

                                      W.P.A. 15714 of 2018
29    19.04.2023
rkd   Ct.15
                       Ram Rampur Girish Chandra Junior High School
                                           -vs-
                             The State of West Bengal & Ors.

                   Mr. Pankaj Halder,
                   Mr. Samarjit Balial,
                   Mr. Sanatan Panja,
                   Mr. Tapas Manna
                                                         ....for the petitioner.
                   Mr. Tapan Kumar Mukherjee,
                   Mr. Ranjan Saha
                                                              ....for the State.
                   Ms. Koyeli Bhattacharyya
                                                             ....for the WBBSE.

                             The writ petition is presented, inter alia,

                   praying for grant of recognition in favour of Ram

                   Rampur       Girish    Chandra   Junior    High   School

                   (hereinafter referred to as the "said school") since it

                   has been submitted on behalf of the petitioner who

                   is Teacher-in-Charge of the said school that

                   pursuant to the order dated 18th April, 2006 passed

                   on the writ petition being WPA 1049 of 2001 only

                   three issues can be looked into by the concerned

                   authorities before grant of recognition, these are -

                   roll strength, sanitation of the school building and

                   supply of drinking water to the school.

                             The attention of this Court has also been

                   drawn to the relevant part of the order dated 18th

                   April, 2006 whereby leave was granted to the

                   school authority to improve sanitation and supply
                           2




of drinking water and to approach the authorities

for taking fresh decision.

         In terms of the said order dated 18th April,

2006 the Secretary of the said school vide letter

dated 15th November, 2006 requested the Secretary

of the Board to take steps since according to the

said     school      authority     improvement        in

infrastructure of the school was made as per the

order dated 18th April, 2006.

         Notice of this Court is also drawn to the

memo dated 9th October, 2012 issued by the

Assistant Secretary, School Education Department

addressed to the Secretary of the West Bengal

Board of Secondary Education whereby the Board

was requested to furnish "Action Taken Report".

         It has been submitted on behalf of the

petitioner that since there is improvement in

sanitation and supply of drinking water in the

school    premises    there    should   not    be   any

impediment in granting recognition of the school in

question as Junior High School pursuant to the

order passed by the coordinate Bench on 18th April,

2006 and unnecessarily the concerned respondent

authorities are withholding grant of recognition as

sought for.

Mr. Mukherjee, learned Additional

Government Pleader appears on behalf of the State

respondents and has placed reliance on the

affidavit-in-opposition affirmed on 29th July, 2019

which contains the report of District Level

Inspection Team (DLIT) prepared on the basis of the

inspection made on 22nd July, 2019. It has been

submitted on behalf of the State respondents as

well as Board that there is no substantial

improvement of sanitation and drinking water

supply in the school premises which is required in

terms of the order passed by the coordinate Bench

dated 18th April, 2006 and the roll strength of the

school as shown is not genuine as it appears from

paragraphs 5 & 6 of the DLIT report dated 24th

July, 2019.

Having considered the submission made on

behalf of the respective parties and on

consideration of the materials available on record,

it appears that previously refusal to grant

recognition in the year 1995 was challenged by the

said school authority and the same was set aside

by the Hon'ble Justice Kalyan Jyoti Sengupta (as

His Lordship then was) vide order dated 1st April,

1998. It was recorded in the order dated 18th April,

2006 passed by the Hon'ble Justice Ashim Kumar

Banerjee (as His Lordship then was) that the points

of rejection as highlighted by the Board in its order

dated 1995 were not kept alive in view of the

decision passed by the coordinate Bench on 1st

April, 1998 and only point which was kept open

according to Ashim Kumar Banerjee, J. was the roll

strength of the school which was required to be

considered while taking decision on grant of

recognition in favour of the said school.

However, while deciding the second writ

petition being WPA 1049 of 2001 Ashim Kumar

Banerjee, J. also added two other infrastructural

issues which according to the Court are required to

be looked into i.e. drinking water facility and

sanitation of the school building.

From the affidavit-in-opposition used on

behalf of the State respondents, it appears that

DLIT inspection was held on 22nd July, 2019 and a

report was prepared on 24th July, 2019 upon

pointing out the following shortcomings with regard

to the infrastructure of the said school as well as

roll strength. The relevant part of the report of the

DLIT dated 24th July, 2019 is quoted below:

"1. With regard to drinking water there is one tube-well in the school premises.

2. There are no drains from the boys'/girls' urinals and as such the

school premises do not have sanitation facilities. Moreover, several water logged pits (which might lead to the spread of vector borne diseases) were observed by the team members.

3. Toilets for students are unhygienic (one urinal for boys & one for girls but no latrine was found). Beside the urinals, there is a canal that often gets overflown with sewage water, which in turn enters into the students' toilet. There exists no facility of running water in the toilets.

4. Report relating to land.

a) Area-12 decimal (Land transferred via gift-deed to the school; no original copy of the said land deed is produced before the DLIT during the inspection;

Certified true copy of the deed was produced in original).

b) The nature of the said 12 decimal of land has been specified as 'Danga'.

c) Copy of 'parcha' (records related to the mutation of the said land in favour of the school) was not produced.

d) Building - Semi-Pucca (Unplastered brick-structure

with tin-roof).

          e)    Electric Meter was installed
                 on       10/07/2019        with
                 reference ID No-104505460,
                 probably in anticipation of
                 the impending DLIT visit.
          f)    No fire safety and natural
                 disaster                fighting
                 arrangement       was    found
                 available.
          g)    No fire NOC was produced
                 before the DLIT during the
                 visit.

5. Report relating to roll strength of the school: It appears that almost all of the students who were present on the date of DLIT visit (22/07/2019) are enrolled in other Government aided/sponsored schools, located in the adjoining areas. They are by no means actual students of the said school. It also appears that the class wise attendance registers of 2019 are filled with fake names.

6. No Admission Register of the said school was produced before the DLIT on 22/07/2019 during the inspection. The TiC of the school gave it in writing that he would submit a photocopy of the said Admission Register of the school at the office of the District Inspector of Schools (S.E.), South 24 Parganas on 24/07/2019 (copy enclosed).

However, on 24/07/2019 he turned up in person at the office of the District Inspector of Schools (S.E.), South 24 Parganas and reported that the said admission register of the school was 'lost' and he had lodged a General Diary at the Diamond Harbour police station in this regard, vide no.2415 dated 23/07/2019".

On perusal of the DLIT report dated 24th

July 2019 it cannot be said that infrastructural

issues which are required to be upgraded by the

said school authority in terms of the order of the

coordinate Bench dated 18th April, 2006 have been

made which would facilitate running of a Co-

Educational Junior High School.

It also appears from the said DLIT report

that the said school authority made an effort to

show that there are adequate number of students

who are prosecuting their studies in the said school

but on scrutiny it was found by the authority that

those students are enrolled in other Government

aided schools located in adjoining areas.

Another issue which does not escape notice

of this Court that the organizing Managing

Committee of the school has not come forward with

the present writ petition, it is the Teacher-in-

Charge who is the petitioner and has approached

with the writ petition after a period of nearly six

years from the date of issuance of the memo dated

9th October, 2012 issued by the Assistant Secretary

addressed to the Board. The writ petition was

instituted on 21st August, 2018.

This Court has posed a query to the learned

advocate representing the petitioner whether any

explanation has been offered in the writ petition on

such delay of nearly six years in approaching the

Court; however this Court does not get any

satisfactory reply. It is well settled as enunciated in

the judgment of the Apex Court, reported in (2007)

9 SCC 278 (New Delhi Municipal Council -vs- Pan

Singh & Ors.), in paragraph 17 it has been held

that though there is no period of limitation

provided for filing writ petition under Article 226 of

the Constitution of India, ordinarily, writ petition

should be filed within a reasonable time.

Considering the enumeration of facts as

made in preceding paragraphs it appears that

petitioner has approached this Court with the

present writ petition after a considerable period of

time (nearly six years) and the same cannot be

countenanced.

In view of aforesaid scenario, the writ

petition stands dismissed.

This order shall not preclude the petitioner

to improve the infrastructure of the school before

approaching the concerned respondent authorities

for grant of recognition and it will be open to the

said school authority to apply before the concerned

authorities in accordance with law after such

improvement of infrastructure.

However, there shall be no order as to

costs.

Urgent photostat certified copy of this

order, if applied for, be given to the learned

Advocates for the parties on the usual

undertakings.

(Saugata Bhattacharyya, J.)