IN THE HIGH COURT OF HIMACHAL PRADESH, SHIMLA CWP No. 4484 of 2009. Date of decision: 8.7.2010 Ms. Shagun Dogra ….. Petitioner. Vs. C.B.S.E. and others …. Respondents. Coram The Hon’ble Mr. Justice Kurian Joseph, Chief Justice. The Hon’ble Mr. Justice Kuldip Singh, Judge. Whether approved for reporting?1 Yes For the Petitioner : Ms. Jyotsna Rewal Dua, Advocate. For the Respondents : Ms. Ritta Goswami, Advocate and Mr. Harsh Aggarwal, Advocate for respondent No. 1. Mr. Anand Sharma, Advocate, for respondent No. 2. Justice Kurian Joseph, C.J. (Oral) The petitioner has approached this court seeking correction of date of birth in the record of CBSE. The learned counsel appearing for the CBSE submits that date of birth having forwarded properly by the school, which presented the child for examination, the same cannot be corrected under any circumstances. The petitioner was born at District Hospital, Kullu on 5.12.1992 and it is seen that within six days, on 11.12.1992 the birth has been registered by the Registrar of Births, as can be seen Whether the reporters of the local papers may be allowed to see the Judgment? - 2 - from Annexure P-1. The child was thereafter admitted under third respondent school. It appears the date of birth was wrongly shown as 5.12.1993. The petitioner obtained a transfer certificate as per Annexure P-3 and got herself admitted under the second respondent school for continuing her study in 5th standard. In Annexure P-3 transfer certificate the date of birth has been shown as 5.12.1993 and on that basis in the admission register of the second respondent school, the date of birth has been entered as 5.12.1993. When this mistake was noticed by the petitioner, steps were taken to get the date of birth corrected in the admission register of third respondent school and the correction is duly endorsed in the admission register by the Principal of the school, as can be seen from Annexure P-4 (page13). Accordingly, a fresh transfer certificate was issued to the petitioner as per Annexure P-4 (page -14), wherein the date of birth has been shown as 5th December 1992 and petitioner requested the second respondent school on that basis to correct the date of birth from 5.12.1993 to 5.12.1992, as per Annexure P-5 representation dated 4.11.2008. The CBSE 10th examinations were held in March 2009 and application was submitted to the school before the registration of the application. As per Annexure P-6, the CBSE requested the school to furnish some more details, the original school record of the previous school. When that was forwarded, the CBSE requested the second respondent school to take action against the erring official in the school, who made wrong entry in the - 3 - admission register. It was replied by the second respondent school as per Annexure P-10 to the effect that mistake was committed not by their school, but by the previous school. But it appears, that school was not affiliated to the CBSE. Be that as it may. The learned counsel for second respondent school which presented the petitioner for the CBSE examination submits that they have realized that a genuine mistake had crept in and hence they took steps well in time for correcting the date of birth and on their part they have taken action within time. 2. The learned counsel for the CBSE, however, submits that there are several disputed questions of facts involved in the case and hence this court under Art. 226 may not go into those facts and the petitioner should be relegated to pursue her civil remedy. It is further submitted that in any case this court will not be justified in issuing direction for correction of date of birth otherwise than in accordance with bye-laws of the CBSE. Reference is invited to the decision of the Supreme Court in Coal India Ltd. & anr. Vs. Ardhendu Bikas Bhattacharjee & ors. 2005(12) SCC 201 and two decisions of Punjab & Haryana High Court in CWP No. 359 of 2009 titled Amandeep Singh vs. Central Board of Secondary Education and others decided on 11.5.2009, CWP No. 13339 of 2009 titled Jagminder Singh vs. Central Board of Secondary Education and another decided on 16.2.2010. - 4 - 3. In order to appreciate the rival contentions taken by the parties, it is necessary to refer to the provisions under the bye- laws regarding the correction of date of birth. Clause 69.2 of the Bye-laws of the CBSE deals with the same, which reads as follows:- “69.2 Change/ Correction in Date of Birth (i) No change in the date of birth once recorded in the Board’s records shall be made. However, corrections to correct typographical and other errors to make the certificate consistent with the school records can be made provided that corrections in the school records should not have been made after the submission of application form for admission to Examination to the Board. (ii) Such correction in Date of Birth of a candidate in case of genuine clerical errors will be made under orders of the Chairman where it is established to the satisfaction of the Chairman that the wrong entry was made erroneously in the list of candidates/ application form of the candidate for the examination. (iii) Request for correction in Date of Birth shall be forwarded by the Head of the School alongwith attested Photostat copies of: (a) application for admission of the candidate to the School; (b) portion of the page of admission and withdrawal register where entry in date of birth has been made; and (c) the School Leaving Certificate of the previous school submitted at the time of admission. - 5 - (iv) The application for correction in date of birth duly forwarded by the Head of School alongwith documents mentioned in byelaws 69.2 (iii) shall be entertained by the Board only within two years of the date of declaration of result of Class X examination. No correction whatsoever shall be made on application submitted after the said period of two years. This will be effective from the examination to be held in March, 1995.” 4. A bare reading of the provisions would show that correction of date of birth is not impermissible. It is permissible and the procedure is also provided under the bye-laws. Clause 69.2 (iv) provides that the application for correction in date of birth duly forwarded by the Head of School alongwith the documents should be entertained by the Board within two years from the date of declaration of result and that no correction whatsoever would be made on application submitted after the said period of two years. Clause 69.2 (i) provides that date of birth once recorded in the Board’s record would not be changed. But it is clarified that correction of typographical mistakes and other errors to make the certificate consistent with the school record can be made, in case the correction in the school record had not been made after the submission of the application form for admission to the examination to the Board. The analysis of the provision would clearly show that what is prohibited is only change of date of birth in the record of the Board and what is permitted is the correction of typographical errors to make the certificate of date of birth - 6 - consistent with the school record. The only rider is that correction of the mistake in the school record should have been made prior to the submission of the application form for admission to the examination to the Board. 5. Analyzing the factual matrix in the instant case, it is seen that the situation falls under the permissible clause. The school records have been corrected prior to the submission of the application for the examination. The same have been duly forwarded by the Head of the School alongwith documents as required by the CBSE within the permitted time for the correction. Therefore, the request of the petitioner is only for action in terms of bye-laws of the CBSE and there being no dispute on these facts, we do not find any justification or need for relegating the petitioner to the ordinary remedy before the civil court. The situation dealt with by the apex court in Coal India case (supra) is entirely different from the facts as stated above. It was a case where service record was sought to be corrected after 38 years joining the service. On analyzing the said facts, it was found that there were several disputed questions of fact particularly as to the duplicate certificate produced by the petitioner therein for correction of date of birth. In the instant case, the petitioner has produced the duly authenticated record of Registrar of Births. It has also to be noted that this action is taken by the petitioner at the earliest opportunity and as contemplated and permitted under the bye-laws of the CBSE and within the permitted time too. All that - 7 - apart, it is also to be seen that the correction of date of birth is to the dis-advantage of the petitioner – she stands to lose one year by correcting the date of birth from 5.12.1992 to 5.12.1993. As far as the decisions by Punjab and Haryana High Court are also concerned, in the case of Amandeep Singh case (supra), the situation was that the certificate produced by the petitioner therein for correction of date of birth did not even disclose the name of the father or the mother and thus the genuineness of the certificate itself was doubted. In Jagminder Singh case (supra) also, the court has observed that identity of the petitioner could not be established in view of the dearth of the factual details. The position as obtaining in the instant case is that there is no dispute as to the identity of the petitioner, there is no dispute for the school which presented the petitioner for examination, there is no dispute on the authenticated certificate issued by the Registrar of Births, there is no dispute that action was taken within the permitted time as provided under the bye-laws and there appears to be no dispute that it is only a typographical mistake committed while entering the year at the time of admission of the child in the nursery class. In the above circumstances, despite the persuasive arguments advanced by the learned counsel for the CBSE, we find that interference by this court under Art. 226 for meeting the ends of justice is warranted and hence the writ petition is allowed directing the first respondent to take steps for correction of the date of birth of the petitioner as recommended by the second respondent- - 8 - school, which presented the petitioner for the examination and which school recommended the correction within the permitted time under the bye-laws. The petitioner shall produce a copy of the judgement alongwith the original certificate issued to her before the first respondent and the needful shall be done within another one month. (Kurian Joseph), C.J. July 8, 2010. (Kuldip Singh), J. (Hem)