Govt can regulate recruitments in minority institutions: SC

Article 30 of the Constitution provides special rights to minority communities to set up and administer their own educational institutions without governmental interference.

"In our considered view, we do not see this to be the interference in the selection process. It would be perfectly all right for a minority institution to select the candidates without any interference from the government.

"However, the requirement of this prior approval is necessitated because it is for the government to see as to whether there was actually posts available in the said institution as per the strength of students and secondly; whether the candidates, who were sought to be appointed, were having the requisite qualifications," a bench of justices V S Sirpurkar and Deepak Verma observed.

The apex court passed the ruling while upholding the Constitutional validity of a circular issued by the Gujarat government that mandated the grant-in-aid minority educational institutions to obtain prior approval of the government for appointment of teaching or non-teaching staff.

Kolawana Gram Vikas Kendra had challenged the validity of the impugned circular after the Gujarat government refused to approve the recruitment of certain staff made by the institution in 2002.

The government refused to grant approval to the recruitment as it was done without prior intimation as stipulated by a 1998 circular.

Aggrieved, the Kendra moved the Gujarat High Court and a single judge bench dismissed the plea. The organisation filed an appeal before a division bench, which upheld the verdict following which it moved the apex court.

Concurring with the findings of the high court the apex court said the intention of the circular was "to enable the government carefully examine whether the proposed appointments were within the framework of the rules considering the workload and the availability of the post in that institution.

"... whether the selected candidates had the necessary qualifications for the subjects. The same applies to the non-teaching staff also."

The bench said all that the circular dated 6.10.1998 provides is that all the government-aided educational institutions will not give effect to any appointment in teaching and non-teaching post without prior approval from the state government or the competent authority.

Hence, such conditions cannot be termed unconstitutional or interference in the functioning of the minority institutions, the apex court said while dismissing the appeal.