I. Shivaleela vs The Professor Jayashankar ...
2022 Latest Caselaw 5249 Tel

        THE HON'BLE THE CHIEF JUSTICE UJJAL BHUYAN
                                   AND
         THE HON'BLE SRI JUSTICE C.V.BHASKAR REDDY


     WRIT APPEAL Nos.653, 668, 669 and 671 of 2022


COMMON JUDGMENT: (Per the Hon'ble the Chief Justice Ujjal Bhuyan)


       This judgment will dispose of W.A.Nos.653, 668, 669

and 671 of 2022.


2.     Heard Mr. Peeta Raman, learned counsel for the

appellants and Mr. B.Thimothi, learned counsel for the

respondents.

3. In all the writ appeals, appellants have assailed

correctness of the view taken by the learned Single Judge

in dismissing W.P.Nos.33879, 34217, 34245 and 34563 of

2022 filed by the appellants as the writ petitioners vide the

common judgment and order dated 26.09.2022.

4. Appellants as the writ petitioners had filed the related

writ petitions assailing the modifications made to

Regulation 9.2 of the Professor Jayashankar Telangana

State Agricultural University Undergraduate Academic

Regulations whereby it has been made mandatory to clear

all backlogs till the third year for promotion/registration to

1st semester of the fourth year B.Sc. (Hons) Agricultural

course for the academic year 2022-23. Consequently,

appellants sought for a direction to the respondents for

their promotion to the 1st semester of the fourth year B.Sc

(Hons) Agricultural course.

5. Appellants are pursuing B.Sc. (Hons) Agricultural

course in the Professor Jayashankar Telangana State

Agricultural University (briefly, 'the Agricultural University'

hereinafter). All the appellants have backlogs in the

second and third years, the details of which have been

mentioned by the learned Single Judge in paragraph 4 of

the judgment under appeal in a tabular form. According to

the appellants, they should be promoted to the fourth year

irrespective of whether they have backlogs or not in the

previous year(s). However, the amended Regulation 9.2

has come in the way. The amended Regulation 9.2 was put

to challenge on the ground that the same is not in

conformity with the report of the Fifth Deans' Committee

constituted by the Indian Council of Agricultural Research

(ICAR).

6. Learned Single Judge referred to the unamended

Regulation 9.2 which may be extracted as under:

"9.2 Promotion to second year: A candidate is automatically promoted to second year irrespective of the number of courses as absent/failed courses in the first year.

Promotion to third year: A candidate should have passed all the courses of first year and should not have more than 6 courses of second year as backlog courses (failed).

Promotion to fourth year: A candidate should have passed all the courses of second year and should not have more than 6 courses of third year as backlog courses (failed).

(Implemented from the academic year 2008-09 onwards)"

7. From the above, learned Single Judge noted that for a

candidate to be eligible for promotion to the fourth year, he

was required to pass all the courses of second year and

should not have more than six courses of third year as

backlogs.

8. In exercise of powers conferred by the Acharya

N.G.Ranga Agricultural University Act, 1963 and following

formation of the State of Telangana, the related Regulations

called, the PJTSAU Regulations, 2016 were framed

commencing from the academic year 2016-17 onwards.

Learned Single Judge noted that the said Regulations

would apply to students admitted from the academic year

2016-17. All the appellants were admitted either during the

academic year 2016-17 or thereafter and therefore those

regulations would be applicable to the appellants,

including amended Regulation 9.2.

9. We may now refer to the amended Regulation 9.2

which is as under:

"9.2 PROMOTION TO SECOND YEAR:

A candidate is automatically promoted to second year irrespective of the number of courses as absent/failed courses in the first year:

PROMOTION TO THIRD YEAR: A candidate should have passed all the courses of first year and should not have more than 6 courses of second year as backlog courses (absent/failed) PROMOTION TO FOURTH YEAR: The students admitted from 2016-17 onwards need to pass all the I, II and III year courses by the end of III year for registering final year courses/Student Ready programmes including electives if any. The non-gradial courses/Student Ready programmes and electives if any are considered on par with other courses for the purpose of promotion to the next year for the students admitted from 2016-17 onwards."

10. From the above it is seen that as per the amended

Regulation 9.2, a candidate is automatically promoted to

the second year irrespective of the number of courses he

has passed in the first year. However, in respect of

promotion to the third year, a candidate should pass all

the courses of the first year and should not have more than

six courses of the second year as backlog courses.

Regarding promotion to the fourth year, the amended

Regulation mandates that students admitted from 2016-17

onwards are required to pass all the preceding three years

courses by the end of third year for registering final year

courses.

11. Insofar the argument that report of the Fifth Deans'

Committee was not considered before making the

amendment thereby vitiating the same, learned Single

Judge held that the report was recommendatory in nature

and could not be construed as mandatory. Even if the

report is construed to be mandatory, learned Single Judge

held that the appellants would have to demonstrate that

the report recommended that without clearing all the

subjects up to the third year, a student would be eligible

for promotion to the fourth year, which they failed to do.

Learned Single Judge thereafter took the view that

appellants were under a misconception that the Fifth

Deans' Committee had recommended promotion of

candidates to the fourth year without clearing all the

subjects up to the third year.

12. In any view of the matter, learned Single Judge did

not find any justifiable reason to render the amended

Regulation 9.2 nugatory.

13. There is one more aspect which was taken note of by

the learned Single Judge. W.P.No.32451 of 2022 was

earlier filed before this Court by the petitioners in

W.P.Nos.34217 and 34245 of 2022 along with Mr. Vangala

Sainath Reddy seeking a direction to the respondents to

promote those petitioners to the fourth year without

insisting on clearance of backlogs. The said writ petition

was dismissed by this Court on 18.08.2022 by holding that

the petitioners were not entitled for the said relief. No

appeal was preferred against the order dated 18.08.2022.

Therefore, the said order had attained finality. Now in the

garb of questioning validity of Regulation 9.2, the related

writ petitions came to be filed seeking the same relief. In

the circumstances, learned Single Judge took the view that

the writ petitions were devoid of any merit and accordingly

dismissed the same.

14. We concur with the views expressed by the learned

Single Judge.

15. First and foremost, the report of the Fifth Deans'

Committee does not say that students should be promoted

to the fourth year without insisting on clearing all the

subjects. Secondly, there is no valid ground to invalidate

the amended Regulation 9.2. Thirdly, in view of Regulation

9.2, as it stands today, which we have analysed above,

relief sought for by the appellants cannot be acceded to

and was rightly turned down by the learned Single Judge.

We are of the considered opinion that the appellants have

no legal right whatsoever to insist on getting promoted to

the fourth year despite having multiple backlogs in the

preceding years.

16. For the reasons indicated above, the writ appeals are

devoid of any merit and are accordingly dismissed. We

thought of imposing costs on the appellants, but

considering the fact that the appellants are students, we

refrain from doing so.

Miscellaneous applications pending, if any, shall

stand closed.

______________________________________ UJJAL BHUYAN, CJ

______________________________________ C.V.BHASKAR REDDY, J 21.10.2022 vs