Aligarh Muslim University Case : Live Updates From Supreme Court Hearing [Day 3]

CJI : its important to clear a congruent, which is that article 30 does not mandate that administration has to be by minority itself, what article 30 contemplates and recognises is the right, mainly the right of choice, the discretion given to minorities to administer in a manner which they deem appropriate.

Sibal giving an example from his experience in being in the governing body of Stephens- most of us were non minority people 

Sibal takes the bench to St Stephens v. University of Delhi

Sibal : the perceptual constitutional genesis is that you cannot have institutions in the country without standardisation in the field of education and that standardisation can only be provided by law under 19 (article) and law will apply to majority and minority institutions and UGC and all statute are consistent under 19, right under 30- the choice is absolute but the regulation has to be done by the parliament, that's the interplay between article 19(6) and 30

Sibal refers to various departments in the AMU - kindly see that the impact of administration is again my choice, in technical things we have no knowledge ....different standards will apply to different disciplines depending upon the nature of the course that I am teaching

CJI : the only difference here... that by the statute itself, you have to induct into your court a large number of those who are not minorities as a matter of statutory inter-right

Sibal : if the statute interferes to the extent that I feel that my right to administration under 30 is being impeded I can challenge it or accept it, Basha never dealt with administration, Basha said I have come to the conclusion that you are not established by a minority and therefore you cannot administer 

CJI : if you apply the expression administer in a very strict sense that it should not include any outsider at all, or excluding on the ground that only 37/180, a minority can never run a university

Sibal : infact it runs contrary to the judgement of courts,St Stephens had only 6% minority students at one point in time

CJI : the object of article 30 and do not take it otherwise is not to ghettoise the minorities, so if you let other people associate with your institution, it doesn't detract from your character as a minority institution.

CJI : refers to an institution which has been incorporated by Central/ State Act , the substantive part of 23 says you cannot use the expression university, the proviso however contemplated that there may have been universities earlier which were using the expression university though they were not covered ...its a sunset clause, they were given 2 yrs to bring themselves in conformity , in this case AMU is not in the proviso for this reason that AMU had already been constitution by that central legislation, which law continued under art 372, your argument is without this they wouldn't be allowed to confer degrees.

CJI : 22 and 23 occupy the different fields, 22 deals with the right to confer a degree, 23 deals with the use of the expression 'university' as part of your name

Sibal : that's right but my argument is where does 22 come from?

J Khanna : just read 22 (1) again 

Sr Adv Kapil Sibal takes the bench through provisions of the UGC Act

J Khanna : please refere to s.23, in this case the proivso may apply and 22 may not apply