HC allows government to inspect colleges

The High Court on Friday allowed the state government’s task forces to carry out inspections of the facilities offered by private professional colleges across the state.

However, acting chief justice P C Ghose and justice Vilas V Afzulpurkar, dealing with writ petitions challenging such inspections, added the proviso that all colleges must be inspected without any discrimination against those that did not bow to the government’s fee structure.

The judges also decreed that the state government must take prior permission from the court before initiating any action against colleges on the basis of the inspection.

The inspection reports would have to be filed before the Admission and Fee Regulatory Committee (AFRC).

Additional advocate-general K G Krishna Murthy had informed the court that the government has certain objections to allowing AFRC to conduct inspections, so task forces were constituted for the purpose. He urged the court to permit the task force inspections.

Dictating the interim order, judge Ghose said, “It appears to us that there is every need to cross-verify the information provided by colleges to the AFRC in accordance with the directions of the Supreme Court.”

The apex court had stipulated that professional colleges would have to submit affidavits to AFRC to enable fixation of fees for the academic year 2012-13. They were required to state whether they have been implementing mandated pay scales for their teaching and non-teaching staff and whether they provide facilities as per norms prescribed by the All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE). The colleges had contended in the High Court that the state government has no power to conduct inspections; only the AICTE could do so.