NEW DELHI: Religious or linguistic minorities’ educational institutions can admit members of their religion or language only up to 50% of the annual admissions.

The balance of the 50% of the annual admissions to such institutions must be available to communities other than the religious or linguistic minority which was established the educational institution. By a 4 to 1 decision the Supreme Court held this on Friday in the case of St Stephens College vs University of Delhi while holding that “minorities” cannot establish educational institutions of their choice only for the benefit of their community”.

Justices M.H. Kania, K.J. Shetty, M. Fathima  Bee viand Yogeshwar Dayal stated that it is subject to this that the Constitution in Article 30(1) gave the religious and linguistic minorities the fundament alright of a“ collective interest of non-assimilation” by the majority. Describing this as the chief reason for putting in Article 30 (1) in the Constitution, the judges held that this included the following rights; the right to preservation and promotion as a community, the right to establish educational institutions of their choice; the right to have institutional preference or reservation for members of their religion or language.  the right against state grant-in-aid being used to annihilate or abridge this right; the right to get financial assistance from public funds in the same way as institutions of majority communities, the right to differential treatment that distinguishes them from the majority to preserve their basic characteristics in spite of the prohibition against discrimination in Article 29(2) on the grounds only of religion or language and the rights of parents of such minorities to have their children educated in institutions having an atmosphere congenial to their own religion or language.

50% on merit

The four judges held (the judgment of the fifth judge, Justice N.M. Kasliwal was not made available by the Supreme Court after pronouncement in open court) that no government or university has the power to compel minority institutions to give up their rights under the guise of regulation. Hence such institutions can have their own procedures of admission for their religious or language candidates but the rest of the 50% of the candidates have to be admitted on merit and merit alone. Pointing out that it was not possible to run educational institutions without state aid, the four judges held that regulation by any government or university must satisfy two tests vis a vis minority educational institutions. One, the regulation must be reasonable, Two, it must be regulative of the educational character of the institution. Both kinds of regulation must have in view the end of making the institution into an effective minority educational institution. State aid to minority educational institutions does not give them an economic advantage over others.

 Non- discrimination.

The judges stated that minority rights under majority rule only begin with nondiscrimination. The protection of interests and institutions and advancement of Opportunity are just as important.

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