Chennai: The Madras high court has directed the Dr Alagappa Chettiar College of Engineering and Technology not to fill 12 seats under the “founder’s quota” in the college until further orders.
A division bench comprising Chief Justice Indira Banerjee and Justice P. Devadass also ordered notice to the state government, AICTE and Anna University and posted to June 14, further hearing of a public interest litigation from advocate E.Sankar.
“The college is presently run by the government. Prima facie, it appears that reservation of 12 seats under the founder’s quota is illegal as per Supreme Court order. There will, therefore, be an interim order directing the authorities of the state to proceed with the selection of candidates. However, no admission shall be made in the founder’s quota until further orders of this court. Admissions may however be made in the general quota and other quotas, if any”, the bench added.
According to petitioner, the college was run by Dr Alagappa Chettiar Educational Trust, which was a public trust. In the year 1985, the trustees of the trust had agreed with the government to handover the colleges under it with all properties attached thereto to the government and the government decided to accept the offer of transfer and to take over certain liabilities of the institution and thus, the college has become a government college. While so, contrary to the admission procedures and various rules and regulations, a provision has been made for admission of certain number of students nominated by the persons claiming to be the family of the founder of the college in the name of founder’s quota. All the seats in the government colleges can be filled up only by the appropriate authority on the basis of marks obtained by the students. The trust and trustees have no right to fill up the government seats according to their whims and fancies and it takes away the valuable rights of meritorious students. The candidates who were not eligible and not having cut off marks were admitted in the college under the guise of founder’s quota, he added and sought to declare as illegal, the admission of students under the founder’s quota.
