ITI can’t admit fresh students without own building: HC

The Punjab and Haryana High Court has made it clear that an Industrial Training Institute (ITI) cannot admit fresh students if it lacks either ownership rights or a registered lease deed for its premises, as required by the National Council for Vocational Training (NCVT) norms.

The ruling by the Division Bench of Chief Justice Sheel Nagu and Justice Sumeet Goel came on a petition filed by a Mohindergarh-based ITI. It had challenged an order proscribing it from admitting fresh trainees and keeping de-affiliation proceedings in abeyance till further orders, or till it submitted a renewed lease deed after obtaining legal possession.

The Bench asserted one of the conditions to seek affiliation for an ITI was a valid ownership for plot and building from where such institute was to function, or a registered lease deed of such premises. The petitioner-society had a valid lease deed, as required under a clause, till August 2019, but the deed was not renewed. The Bench observed that the petitioner’s stand in the matter was that it had attained the status of a “statutory” tenant (who retains possession). As such, it could not be evicted except in accordance with the applicable tenancy law. The State, among others, was represented by Additional Advocate-General Deepak Balyan.

The Bench asserted the rules carried the weight of binding statutory norms and were required to be strictly followed when specific conditions for granting affiliations had been set by a regulatory body. The courts should not interfere with such specialised regulations unless there was clear illegality, arbitrariness, or a violation of fundamental rights.

“No jurisdictional error has been pointed in the impugned order, so as to warrant interference by this Court under its writ jurisdiction. On the contrary, we find that the impugned order works out in favour of the welfare of the trainees whose admission is sought to be made by the institute in question since their admission to an institute not having requisite premises may land their career in doldrums,” the Bench observed.

The Bench added its indulgence would inevitably precipitate a grave and avoidable misfortune. The dire consequences would fall not upon the institute or the petitioner-society, but the innocent and unsuspecting trainees in “regrettable eventuality of the petitioner-society’s failure to secure lawful leasehold rights over the premises”.

Dismissing the petition, the Bench added: “It is these trainees who would be left rudderless, their admissions imperiled and their academic progression cast into an abyss of uncertainty, all through no fault or omission of their own. It is the solemn duty of this Court, as the sentinel on the qui vive for the rights of the most vulnerable, to ensure that no student is subjected to such an ordeal”.

Haryana Tribune