High Court
Legal Reasoning
2 be calculated from its payment to respondent no.4 i.e. from13-9-2022 upto its actual refund, if so made by respondentno.4; F]Pending, hearing and final disposal of the Writ petition,the respondent nos.1, 2, 4 to 6 may please be directed todeposit in the registry of this Honourable Court, an amount ofRs.2,74,531/-, which was charged wrongly by respondent no.4to petitioner, as full fees for engineering course;G]Any other relief deemed fit, may please be granted.”3.The Petitioner was admitted as the student in the RespondentNo.4 – Institute on the seat reserved for Scheduled Tribe category as heclaimed to be belonging to ‘Koli Mahadev’ category. The Petitioner’stribe claim was pending before the concerned Respondent No.3 –Scrutiny Committee. Since Respondent No.3 – Scrutiny Committee hadinvalidated the Petitioner’s tribe claim, he was apprehending coerciveaction by the Respondent No.4 - Institute and therefore, to protect hisadmission he approached this Court in Writ Petition No.4541 of 2017, inwhich the following order was passed on 03.05.2017.“Notice to respondents, returnable on 19.06.2017.Learned A.G.P. waives service of notice for respondentnos.1 and 2. Respondent nos.3 and 4 shall permit the applicant toappear for examination and prosecute his studies withoutinsisting for caste certificate and payment of full fees.”4.The Petitioner had completed his degree from Respondent No.4 –Institute in the year 2020. The Petitioner was in need of the originaldocuments, which were deposited with the Respondent No.4 – Institute. 3 The Respondent No.4 – Institute insisted for paying the full fees. Asthere was no validity certificate, the Petitioner paid the full fees which ismeant for the Open Competition Seat. The Respondent No.4 - Institutereturned the original documents to the Petitioner. 5.The Petitioner had challenged the order of Respondent No.3 –Scrutiny Committee invalidating his tribe claim, before this Court in WritPetition No.9776 of 2021 which came to be allowed by order dated13.09.2023. The operative order of the said Judgment reads as under:“14.The Writ Petitions are partly allowed.15.The impugned orders are quashed and set aside. Therespondent- scrutiny committee shall immediately issuecertificates of validity to the petitioners of ‘Koli Mahadav’scheduled tribe. Those certificates shall be subject to the finaloutcome of Gajanan’s matter which the committee has decidedto reopen.16.The petitioners shall not be entitled to claim equities.”6.Now, the Petitioner has approached this Court with the abovereferred prayers. The Petition is opposed by the State and RespondentNo.4 – Institute. They have filed their respective Reply Affidavits onrecord. We have heard both the sides at length. Perused the papers onrecord.7.Undisputedly, the Petitioner’s admission with Respondent No.4 –Institute was on the seat reserved for Scheduled Tribe candidate. It isnot in dispute that as per the Government policy the Caste Validity 4 Certificate was to be submitted at the time of the admission. Initiallythe Respondent No.4 - Institute accepted the fees payable by thecandidate belonging to reserved category, from the Petitioner. Pursuantto the order passed by this Court, the Petitioner completed his degreecourse from Respondent No.4 – Institute. Admittedly, Respondent No.3– Scrutiny Committee validated his tribe Claim on 05.10.2023 pursuantto the order passed by this Court. However, in the meanwhile, thePetitioner paid the full fees to Respondent No.4 – institute on13.09.2022 by giving undertaking that he will withdraw Writ PetitionNo.9776 of 2021 which was admittedly against the invalidation of histribe claim. We failed to understand as to what bearing the said WritPetition was having with the fees of Respondent No.4 – Institute.According to the Petitioner, he was left with no other option, but to givein writing such letter to the Respondent No.4 – Institute to pay theentire fees meant for the Open Competition Candidate and withdraw thesaid Petition. Needless to state that, it was not in the Petitioner’s controlto decide tribe claim which was pending with the Respondent No.3 -Scrutiny Committee. From Government Resolution dated 31.03.2016the admission process and payment of fees was through online mode.According to the learned AGP, since the said online mode is no more inoperation, it would not be possible to refund the fees to the RespondentNo.4- Institute. From all these undisputed facts, we see no fault of thePetitioner to deprive him of refund of the fees which he had to pay for 5 getting his original documents back from the Respondent No.4 –Institute.8.Learned A.G.P. expressed apprehension that this order mayopen flood gates for other Petitions and the State would be burdenedwith financial implications. In our view, there is no substance in suchapprehension, for more than one reason. The Petitioner herein belongsto Scheduled Tribe. He had applied for a seat reserved for such categorycandidate. He was even granted admission reserved for such categorycandidate. The Petitioner’s Tribe claim was turned down by the ScrutinyCommittee. The Petitioner, therefore, approached this Court. ThisCourt directed the Scrutiny Committee to grant validity to thePetitioner’s Tribe Certificate. Before that, this Court, on Civil Application(No.6275/2017), had directed the Respondents herein to permit theApplicant to appear for the examination and prosecute his studieswithout insisting for Caste Certificate and payment of full fees. Sincethe purpose was served, on passing of the said order, the Writ Petitionwas withdrawn. On completion of his graduation successfully,the Petitioner secured a job. The employer insisted him tosubmit documents including his Tribe Certificate. Since theCertificate and other documents were with the Respondent No.4 –Educational Institute, the Petitioner approached them. The College
Arguments
1 IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT BOMBAYBENCH AT AURANGABAD.41 WRIT PETITION NO.3723 OF 2024Sandeep Nivrutti JinkalwadVersusThe State of Maharashtra Through Secretary And Others…..Shri. Amit A. Mukhedkar, Advocate for the PetitionerMs. P. J. Bharad, AGP for the Respondent / State. Shri. S. Y. Mahajan, Advocate for Respondent No.4…..CORAM : R. G. AVACHAT AND NEERAJ P. DHOTE, JJ.Dated : JULY 14, 2025PER COURT :-. Heard finally at the admission stage with the consent of all thesides. 2.In the present Writ Petition filed under Article 226 of theConstitution of India, the Petitioner has made the following prayers:“B]Record and proceeding may please be called for;C]By issuing a Writ of Mandamus or any other Writ ororder of a like nature, the respondent nos.1, 2, 4 to 6 mayplease be directed to refund to the petitioner, an amount ofRs.2,74,531/-, which was charged wrongly by respondent no.4as full fees for engineering course;D]To hold and declare that, the act of respondent no.4 oflevying full fees of engineering course meant for an opencategory candidate, to the petitioner who is a reserved classcategory candidate belonging to 'Mahadeo Koli' caste falling inSchedule tribe category, is illegal, wrong, unreasonable andarbitrary.E]The respondent no.4-college, may please be directed topay to the petitioner, interest @ 18% p.a on Rs.2,74,531/-, to
Decision
6 Principal appears to have insisted the Petitioner to give in writing thathe would pay the entire fees and withdrew the Writ Petition. ThePetitioner’s promise to withdraw did not have any concern with thepayment of fees. The said clause in writing submitted by the Petitionerappears to have been incorporated at the behest of College authorities. 9.In the peculiar facts and circumstances of the case, namelythe Petitioner was granted admission on reserved category seat,challenging the order of the Scrutiny Committee turning down his claim,his Tribe claim to have been validated in a Writ Petition preferred byhim, and it was not within his control to place before the authoritiesconcerned the validity certificate regarding his Tribe claim within a timeframe. The Petitioner, therefore, needs to be reimbursed of the fees hepaid over and above the fees meant for reserved category. In view ofthe above, we proceed to pass the following order. O R D E R(i)The Writ Petition is allowed. (ii)The Respondent No.4 - Institute shall refund the fees to thePetitioner which they have charged as the OpenCompetition Candidate, by deducting the fees which ispayable by the candidate belonging to the Scheduled Tribecandidate, within a period of eight (8) weeks. (iii)The Respondent Nos.1, 2 and 6 shall reimburse theRespondent No.4 – Institute in respect of the fees of thePetitioner, twelve (12) weeks thereafter. 7 (iv)The Petitioner shall provide his Bank Account Number tothe Respondent No.4 - Institute. (v)Petition stands disposed off accordingly.( NEERAJ P. DHOTE, J. )( R. G. AVACHAT, J. )GGP