Aligarh Muslim College minority standing case: The Supreme Courtroom, by a 4-3 majority, on Friday overruled the 1967 judgment in S. Azeez Basha vs. Union Of India that grew to become the idea for denying the minority standing to the Aligarh Muslim College. It, nonetheless, left it to a three-judge bench to find out afresh the minority standing of the AMU, based mostly on the ideas advanced on this judgment.
A seven-judge Structure bench of the Supreme Courtroom delivered 4 separate judgments within the Aligarh Muslim College minority standing case. Chief Justice DY Chandrachud, who headed the bench, stated there have been 4 separate opinions, together with three dissenting verdicts.
The CJI stated he has written the bulk verdict for himself and Justices Sanjiv Khanna, JB Pardiwala, Manoj Misra.
Justice Chandrachud stated Justices Surya Kant, Dipankar Datta and Satish Chandra Sharma had penned their separate dissenting verdicts.
The bench had reserved its verdict on the query on February 1 after listening to arguments for eight days.
On February 1, grappling with the intractable concern of the AMU’s minority standing, the highest court docket stated the 1981 modification to the AMU Act, which successfully accorded it a minority standing, solely did a “half-hearted job” and didn’t restore to the establishment the place it had previous to 1951.
Whereas the AMU Act, 1920 speaks about incorporating a instructing and residential Muslim college in Aligarh, the 1951 modification does away with obligatory spiritual directions for the Muslim college students on the college.
The vexed query has repeatedly examined Parliament’s legislative acumen and judiciary’s prowess in deciphering complicated legal guidelines involving the establishment that was based in 1875 as Muhammadan Anglo-Oriental Faculty by distinguished Muslim neighborhood members led by Sir Syed Ahmed Khan. Years later in 1920, it remodeled right into a college beneath the British Raj.
“One factor which is worrying us is that the 1981 modification doesn’t restore the place because it stood previous to 1951. In different phrases, the 1981 modification does a half-hearted job,” Justice Chandrachud had stated whereas continuing to shut the arguments.
“I can perceive if the 1981 modification had stated… okay, we’re going again to the unique 1920 statute, confer full minority character on this (establishment),” the CJI had stated.
Earlier, the BJP-led NDA authorities refused to simply accept the 1981 modification to the AMU Act and insisted that the court docket ought to go by the five-judge structure bench verdict within the S Azeez Basha versus Union of India case in 1967. The Structure bench had then held that for the reason that AMU was a central college, it can’t be thought of a minority establishment.
The highest court docket had stated it wanted to look at the 1981 modification and whether or not it restored the establishment to the standing it loved earlier than 1951.
Those that put ahead the view favouring a minority standing for the establishment, together with veteran lawyer Kapil Sibal, contended that the mere incontrovertible fact that solely 37 of the 180-member governing council is Muslim doesn’t detract from its credentials as a Muslim minority establishment.
Others like Solicitor Common Tushar Mehta contended a college getting huge funds from the Centre and having been declared an establishment of nationwide significance can not declare to belong to a specific spiritual denomination.
The Allahabad excessive court docket had struck down the supply of the 1981 regulation by which the college was accorded minority standing. Appeals had been filed within the apex court docket, together with by the AMU, towards the excessive court docket verdict.
The row over the AMU’s minority standing has been caught in a authorized maze for the final a number of many years.
The highest court docket referred the contentious concern to a seven-judge bench on February 12, 2019. An analogous reference was additionally made in 1981.
The Congress-led UPA authorities on the Centre moved in an enchantment towards the 2006 verdict of the Allahabad Excessive Courtroom that quashed the 1981 modification to the AMU Act. The college additionally filed a separate petition towards it.
The NDA authorities spearheaded by the BJP informed the Supreme Courtroom in 2016 that it’ll withdraw the enchantment filed by the erstwhile UPA dispensation.
It cited the apex court docket’s 1967 judgement within the Basha case to say that AMU was not a minority establishment because it was a central college funded by the federal government.
