Unaffiliated colleges admitting students is disastrous, says SC

Apex court said such conduct has become a ‘disease’ which is a ‘disastrous phenomenon’.

New Delhi:

The Supreme Court on Wednesday disapproved the tendency among unaffiliated colleges and other educational institutions admitting students, saying such conduct has become a "disease" which is a "disastrous phenomenon".

The remarks came as it dealt with the issue of admission of students by a Uttar Pradesh college, whose three-year provisional affiliation had expired last year and it had failed to get permanent affiliation within the stipulated time frame to induct students for the 2015-16 academic session.

The college's plea against rejection of affiliation was dismissed by Allahabad High Court's single judge bench and a division bench.

The apex court bench of justices Dipak Misra and Shiva Kirti Singh refused to interfere with two orders of the high court with a critical observation. "The controversy does not end here. The stand of the University is that the appellant College has admitted students without having the necessary affiliation for the academic session 2015-16. This kind of conduct has become a disease, and when the conduct becomes a disaster, it is a disastrous phenomenon," the bench said.

The apex court observed that university had not granted affiliation to the college as scheduled time for it was over.

However, the bench said that if the university has not already considered the plea of Anuragi Devi Degree College for affiliation, it should do so within four weeks.

In 2012, the state government had granted permission for provisional affiliation to the college for three years for imparting education in Arts faculty after which the Deen Dayal Upadhyay Gorakhpur University had allowed it to admit students.

In March 2015, the college applied to the university for constituting an inspection panel for granting of permanent affiliation but the report was not received within the time schedule prescribed by the state government.

The university did not grant permanent affiliation to the college for academic session 2015-16 due to lack of required inspection report.