1 IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT BOMBAY BENCH AT AURANGABAD WRIT PETITION NO. 731 OF 2007 Ravindra Punjabrao Girnale .. Petitioner Versus Yashwantrao Chavan Maharashtra Open University, Nashik and others .. Respondents Shri S. B. Talekar, Advocate for the Petitioner. Shri S. C. Bora, Advocate for the Respondent No. 1. Shri C. V. Dharurkar, Advocate for the Respondent Nos. 2 and 3. Shri S. K. Tambe, A. G. P. for the Respondent No. 4. CORAM : B. R. GAVAI & N. D. DESHPANDE, JJ. DATE : 22nd July, 2009. ORAL ORDER [ Per B. R. Gavai, J.] : 1. Rule. Rule made returnable forth. Heard by consent. By way of present petition the petitioner challenges order dated 25.01.2007 by which the respondent No. 1 University has 2 withdrawn the B. Ed. degree granted to the petitioner in the year 1999. 2. Though, the petitioner has raised several grounds in the present petition, however, we are inclined to go into all the grounds, since we are of the considered view that, present petition needs to be allowed on the short ground that the petitioner has not been given sufficient opportunity to defend himself before the impugned order was passed. 3. It is specific contention of the petitioner that the application form was not written by him, but was written by one Willfred Saldhana, who happen to be principal of respondent No. 2. It is specific contention that only after some dispute arouse between petitioner and said Willfred Saldhana, the proceedings were initiated at the instance of Willfred Saldhana. Shri Dharurkar learned counsel appearing for the respondent No. 2 specifically denied this stand of the petitioner. He submits that the form was not submitted by the management. He further submits that signature of the said Willfred Saldhana is forged and the stamp of the school is also misused. 4. From the perusal of the pleadings it appears that, it is specific contention of the petition that this basic document has not been supplied to him. We find that the said document would be relevant for deciding as to whether, the petitioner has taken admission on the forged claim or the said application is written by 3 some one else. 5. In that view of the matter, we find in the interest of justice that deno inquiry be conducted against the petitioner following principles of natural justice, after supplying all the documents to the petitioner on which the university relies. The petition is therefore, allowed in following terms : 1) The impugned order dated 25.01.2007 is quashed and set aside. 2) Matter is remanded back to the respondent No. 1/University to conduct the inquiry against the petitioner deno novo. 3) It is needless to state, that the petitioner shall be supplied all the documents on which the respondent No. 1/University relies against the petitioner. 4) The petitioner if so desires would be at liberty to make an application for referring the document in question to the hand writing expert. If such an application is made, the respondent No. 1 shall allow the said application, as we are of the considered view that the question as to who has written the details on the said application would go to the root of the matter. 5) The petitioner shall appear before the Registrar of respondent No. 1/University on 10th August, 2009 and shall also co-operate with the inquiry conducted by the respondent No. 1. 6) Needless to state that since we are allowing the petition on the short ground of non compliance with the 4 principles of natural justice, we have not touched upon other issues involving in the matter and other issues are kept open to be raised at appropriate stage. 7) Rule made absolute in above terms. [ N. D. DESHPANDE, J.] [ B. R. GAVAI, J.] bsb/July 09