1 IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT BOMBAY NAGPUR BENCH : NAGPUR WRIT PETITION NO.509 OF 2009 (Shrikant Rameshpant Ganorkar and others vs. Navsanjivan Shikshan Prasarak Mandal and others) ___________________________________________________________________ Office Notes, Office Memoranda of Coram, appearances, Court's orders Court's or Judge's orders or directions and Registrar's orders. CORAM : D.D. SINHA AND A.P. BHANGALE, JJ. DATED : FEBRUARY 11, 2009 Heard Shri Nemade, learned Counsel for the petitioners, and Shri Mujumdar, learned Assistant Government Pleader for the respondent no.5. The grievance of the petitioners is in respect of communication dated 18.10.2008 issued by the respondent no.3 University whereby petitioners and others were informed that though the College of Agriculture, Darwha is affiliated to Punjabrao Deshmukh Krishi Vidyapeeth, Akola, however, entire administration of the College is being looked after by the Management, of Navsanjivan Shikshan Prasarak Mandal, Darwha and in view of provisions of Statute 118 of the Maharashtra Agriculture University Statutes 1990, the Vice Chancellor of the 2 respondent no.3 University does not have jurisdiction to consider the representation of the petitioners. Shri Nemade, learned Counsel for the petitioners, states that petitioners and others, on earlier occasion, had filed Writ Petition No. 3120/2008, which was disposed of by this Court vide order dated 25.7.2008, which reads thus : “1) Shri Nemade, learned Counsel for the petitioners seeks permission to withdraw the present writ petition, since the petitioner has already made representation dated 08.06.2008, to the Grievance Committee headed by the Vice Chancellor, Punjabrao Krishi Vidyapeet, which is pending and, therefore, he seeks direction to the Grievance Committee to decide the same within stipulated period. 2) The writ petition is disposed of as withdrawn with direction to the Grievance Committee to decide the above referred representation of the petitioner, if not decided earlier, on its own merits, according to law and procedure applicable in this regard, within a period of six weeks from the date of communication of this order.” It is further submitted by the learned Counsel for the petitioners that the respondent University moved an application for modification of aforesaid order dated 25.7.2008 on the ground that the Grievance 3 Committee is not legally competent to consider the grievance of the petitioners made in the representation and sought permission of this Court to forward the said representation to the Vice Chancellor of the respondent no.3 University for redressal of grievance. This Court granted the said request vide order dated 5.9.2008, which reads thus : “Heard Mr. Nemade, Adv. for applicant and Mr. Jaiswal, Assistant Government Pleader for respondent no.3. Civil Application No. 6434 of 2008 is moved by the applicant/respondent no.3 for re-calling the order dt. 25.7.2008 passed by this Court whereby Writ Petition No.3116 of 2008 came to be disposed of as withdrawn with liberty to the petitioner to make a representation to the Grievance Committee of Dr. Punjabrao Deshmukh Krishi Vidyapeeth, Akola, which was directed to decide the same in accordance with law. Mr. Jaiswal, Adv. for applicant/ respondent no.3 has submitted that the Grievance Committee is not legally competent to consider the grievance of the petitioner made in the representation and, therefore, seeks permission to forward the same to the Vice Chancellor of Dr. Panjabrao Deshmukh Krishi Vidyapeeth, Akola to whom the representation is addressed. Considered the contentions canvassed by the respective Counsel. It is open for the Grievance Committee of Dr. Panjabrao Deshmukh Krishi Vidyapeeth, Akola to forward the representation submitted by the petitioner to the Vice Chancellor of Dr. Panjabrao Deshmukh Krishi Vidyapeeth for deciding the same in 4 accordance with law within a period of one week. We direct the Vice Chancellor to decide the said representation on its own merits according to law and procedure applicable in this regard within a period of six weeks from the date of receipt of such representation from the Grievance Committee. Accordingly, the civil application is allowed and the impugned order dt. 25.7.2008 stands modified to that extent accordingly. Copy of this order, duly authenticated, be supplied to the Counsel for respective parties.” Shri Nemade, learned Counsel for the petitioners, states that the respondent University now by the impugned communication once again communicated to the petitioners that it has no jurisdiction to consider the representation of the petitioners. It is, therefore, prayed that appropriate direction may be issued. It is really unfortunate that the petitioners are required to run from pillar to post since the respondent University is not in a position to decide which Authority is competent to consider the representation of the petitioners. The representation of the petitioners was directed to be considered by the Grievance Committee of the University. The said direction was modified in view of statement made by the learned Counsel for the respondent University and now the respondent University is expressing its inability to consider the representation vide the 5 impugned communication. In the circumstances, we direct the Vice Chancellor of the respondent University to forward the representation of the petitioners to the Authority competent to consider the grievance of the petitioners made in the said representation as per provisions of the relevant Act and Rules within a period of fifteen days from the date of communication of this order. The said Authority is directed to decide the representation of the petitioners on its own merits in accordance with law within a period of four weeks from the date of receipt of such representation from the Vice Chancellor of the respondent University. With these observations and directions, the petition is disposed of. The Registrar (Judicial) is directed to communicate this order to the Vice Chancellor of the respondent University forthwith for necessary compliance. JUDGE JUDGE khj