http://JUDIS.NIC.IN SUPREME COURT OF INDIA Page 1 of 6  

PETITIONER: THE BOARD OF HIGH SCHOOL & INTER-MEDIATE EDUCATION U. P.

       Vs.

RESPONDENT: BAGLESHWAR PRASAD & OTHERS

DATE OF JUDGMENT: 27/08/1962

BENCH: GAJENDRAGADKAR, P.B. BENCH: GAJENDRAGADKAR, P.B. GUPTA, K.C. DAS DAYAL, RAGHUBAR

CITATION:  1966 AIR  875            1963 SCR  (3) 767  CITATOR INFO :  E          1969 SC 198  (14)

ACT: Domestic   Tribunal-Educational   body-Disciplinary   action -Interference by High Court-Constitution of India, Art.226.

HEADNOTE: The appellant Board cancelled the declaration of the  result of the respondent in the High School Certificate Examination held  in  1960 accepting the findings  of  the  subcommittee appointed by it to enquire into the charges made against the respondent and another candidate of having used unfair means in answering the English, Mathematics and Hindi papers.  The charges were based upon the fact that in the Hindi 3rd paper set  at  the  said examination, the  respondent  gave  wrong answers  to  Question No. 4 in precisely the  same  form  in which the answers had been given by the candidate whose Roll number  was  consecutive with that of the  respondent.   The High  Court interpreting the charge as confined to that  the respondent  had  copied either from the answer book  of  the candidate  bearing  the consecutive Roll Number  or  from  a common  source  held  that  the  findings  of  the   enquiry committee  were  based  on  no  evidence  and  quashed   the cancellation of the result.On appeal by special leave. Held, that in the circumstances of the case, the identity of the  wrong answers given by the respondent with that of  the other candidate bearing the consecutive Roll Number rendered the  charge of the respondent having employed  unfair  means highly  probable  and  that  the  findings  of  the  enquiry committee  based upon such probabilities and  circumstantial evidence could not be said to be based on no evidence as  in such   matters  direct  evidence  quite  often   cannot   be available. Held,  further,  that in dealing with cases  like  those  of educational institutions dealing with matters of  discipline like  employing  unfair  means, the  problem  faced  by  the educational institutions should be appreciated by the  ’High Court  and so long as the enquiry held is fair  and  affords the  candidate an opportunity to defend himself, the  matter should 768

http://JUDIS.NIC.IN SUPREME COURT OF INDIA Page 2 of 6  

not  be examined with the same strictness as  applicable  to criminal trials in the ordinary courts of law.

JUDGMENT: CIVIL APPELLATE JURISDICTION: Civil Appeal No. 328 of 1962.  Appeal  by special leave from the judgment and order  dated September  4,  1961, of the Allahabad High  Court  in  Civil Misc. writ No. 3469 of 1960. K.   L. Misra, Advocate-General for the State of U.    P., C.  B.  Agarwala,  K.  S. Hajela and  C.  P.  Lal,  for  the appellants. S.   P. Sinha and M. 1. Khowaja, for respondent No. 1. 1962.  August 27.  The Judgement of the Court was  delivered by GAJENDRAGADKAR,  J.-This appeal by special leave arises  out of a Writ Petition filed by the respondent Bagleshwar Prasad against the Board of High School and Intermediate Education, U.  P., Allahabad, and its Secretary, appellants 1 & 2,  and another.   By  his petition, the respondent  challenged  the validity of the order passed by appellant No. 1 on  December 5,  1960,  cancelling the respondent’s result  at  the  High School  Examination  held  in 1960.   It  appears  that  the respondent appeared for the said examination from the  Nehru Intermediate  College  Centre, Bindki.  He was  declared  to have  passed  the said examination in the 11  Division  with distinction  in  Art.  Thereafter,  he  joined  Intermediate first year class in the Kulbaskar Ashram Agriculture College at  Allahabad.   On the 3rd September, 1960, he  received  a letter  from the Principal, Adarsh Higher Secondary  School, Kora  Jahanabad,  from where he had appeared  for  the  High School examination, calling upon him to appear before a Sub- Committee  to answer the charge of having used unfair  means in English,                             769 Mathematics  and  Hindi papers.   Accordingly,  he  appeared before  the said Sub-Committee.  A charge was given  to  him and  his explanation was obtained on the said charge.   This charge was based on the fact that in Hindi 3rd paper set  at the said examination, the respondent had given wrong answers to  Question No. 4 in precisely the same firm in  which  the said  answers had been given by a candidate whose  Roll  No. was  91733.   The  respondont’s Roll  No.  was  91731.   The respondent was shown the identical wrong answers to the said Question  which  were found in the two papers,  and  he  was asked  to  explaining about the said identity of  the  wrong answers.  He admitted that the wrong answers appeared to  be identical, but he denied that he had used any unfair  means. The  Sub-Committee  however,  was  not  satisfied  with  the explanation  and reported that both the respondent  and  the candidate  whose Roll No. was 94733 had used  unfair  means. As  a  result of the report made by the  Sub-Committee,  the first  appellant passed an order cancelling the  results  of both the candidates.  Both the said candidates disputed  the validity  of  the said order, in the Allahabad  High  Court. The petition filed by the candidate whose Roll No. was 94733 was  dismissed, but that of the respondent was allowed,  and the impugned order passed by appellant No-1 cancelling,  the result of the respondent in the High School examination  for 1960, has been set aside.  It is against this order that the appellants have come to this Court by special leave. From  the petition field by the the High Court (W.   P.  No. 3469 of 1960) it appears that he challenged the validity  of the  impugned  order  on  several  grounds.   The  principal

http://JUDIS.NIC.IN SUPREME COURT OF INDIA Page 3 of 6  

contentions raised by the petitioner against the  competence and  the  authority  of  appellant  No.1  and  against   the regularity  and  fairness  of the enquiry  held,  srose  for decision-  before the High Court in the companion W. P.  No. 3196 of 1960 also.  The High 770 Court rejected the said contentions of law in that W.  P. and  for  the  reasons  recorded in  the  judgment  in  that petition, the said contentions were rejected even   in   the present petition.  Thus, the challenge  to  the validity  of the order made on points of law was not sustained. The  High Court then proceeded to examine the narrow  ground of  attack against the validity of the order which was  made on  the basis that the impugned order was not  supported  by any  evidence at all.  It appears from the judgment  of  the High  Court that the High court was inclined to accept  this argument  and it has set aside the order on the ground  that it  is  not supported by any evidence.  The  correctness  of this finding is seriously disputed before us by the  learned Advocate-General who appears for the appellants. It  is common ground that the proceed in taken  against  the respondent  in respect of the unfair means alleged  to  have been adopted by him at the examination, are in the nature of quasi-judicial  proceedings, and as such, in a proper  case, orders  passed as a result of the said proceedings would  be liable  to be challenged under Art.226 of the  Constitution. It  is  also  common ground that the  High  Court  would  be justified in quashing the impugned order if it is  satisfied that the said order is not based on any evidence at all.  An order passed by a Tribunal holding a quasi-judicial  enquiry which is not supported by any evidence, is an order which is erroneous  on  the face of it and as such, is liable  to  be quashed   by  the  High  Court  in  exercise  of  its   high prerogative jurisdiction to issue a writ under Art. 226. In  the  present  case, the High Court has  found  that  the conclusion of the enquiry Committee that the respondent  had copied either from the answer book of the candidate  bearing Roll No-947 3 or                             771 from  a common source, was not supported by any evidence  In coming  to this conclusion, the High Court has assumed  that the  charge  against the respondent was that he  had  copied from the candidate bearing Roll No. 94733.  Having made this assumption,  the High Court has observed that there  was  no charge against the respondent that he connived in the act of copying by the other candidate ,from his answer-book, and it has  added  that  there  is no evidence  in  proof  of  such connivance.  The High Court has also stated that no evidence had been shown to justify the allegations that any  outsider had  helped the candidate, including the respondent.   That, in brief, is the genesis of the final conclusion of the High Court. It appears that the High Court was in error in assuming that the  only  charge  against the respondent was  that  he  had copied  from  the paper of the candidate  bearing  Roll  No. 94733 and this error is basically responsible for the  other observations made by the High Court.  The translation of the charge  as it has been printed in the record before  us,  no doubt,  seems  to support the assumption made  by  the  High Court in regard to the nature of the charge’ But the  charge was  framed in Hindi and it is common ground before us  that the  Hindi charge has not been properly translated from  the record  when it seems to show that what was alleged  against the  respondent  was  only  that  he  had  copied  out  from candidate bearing Roll No. 94733.  The charge, in terms, was

http://JUDIS.NIC.IN SUPREME COURT OF INDIA Page 4 of 6  

that having regard to the identity of the mistaken  answers, the  apprehension was that there had been copying, and  that is very different from saying that the only charge was  that the  respondent had copied from the other  candidate.   This position is made very clear when we consider the explanation given by the respondent.  In his explanation, the respondent bad 772 stated that he had not copied out from the answer-, book  of any  candidate, nor had he allowed anyone to copy  out  from his  answer-book, so far as he could.  He admitted that  the mistaken  answers  in the two papers were identical  and  he pleaded  ’that  he could not say any thing as  to  why  this happened.   He  was also asked whether he had got  any  help from  outside  and he gave an answer in  the  negative.   It would  thus be seen that at the enquiry, the charge  against the  respondent  was, either that he copied  from  candidate bearing  Roll  No. 94733, or that he connived  at  the  said candidate copying from his answer-book, or that both of them had copied from a common source.  In either case, ’it  would amount to the adoption, of unfair means.  Therefore, in  our opinion,  the High Court was in error in assuming  that  the charge  was  very narrow and did not include the  two  other alternatives  on  which  the adoption of  unfair  means  was sought to be established. There   is  another  circumstance  which  is  relevant   and significant  and that has been ignored by the High Court  in dealing   with  this  petition:  It  appears  that  at   the examination held at Bindki Centre, unfair means were adopted on a very large scale by a large number of students and  the examination appears to have been conducted in an  atmosphere which  was  not at all congenial to the enforcement  of  the discipline   which   has  to  be  observed   in   conducting examinations.  It appears that there are rivalries and party politics  in  the Municipal Board of Bindki  that  runs  the institution  at which this examination was held,  and  there are rivalries and party politics even amongst the members of the  staff.   The members of the Municipal Board  and  other influential  people of the locality bring undue pressure  on the  Principal and the Invigilators to help their  wards  or the wards                             773 of  their friends and relatives in the Board’s  Examination. As  a  result of this unhealthy atmosphere,  the  Centre  at Bindki  for High School examination had been  abolished  for some  years,  but on account of public pressure it  was  re- started in 1960, and the result was very unfortunate. It  also  appears that on the day of  English  paper,  while students  were answering the paper in Room No. 3, an  answer paper by some outsider was dropped into the room 15  minutes before  the time to answer questions was over.’  This  paper was  thrown in room No. 3 from room No. 18.  It was a  typed paper  giving answers to all the Questions.   The  Assistant teacher,   Khajuha,  who  was  one  of   the   Invigilators, complained  that the Parcha was typed in the office  of  the Superintendent  of  the  Centre,  but  this  allegation  was denied.   Indeed, from the reports made by the  invigilators and  the findings made by the Enquiry Committee, it  appears that the Invigilators themselves were so much frightened  by the  prevailing  rowdyism and by pressure  from  influential people  that  they found themselves  powerless  to  maintain discipline  in the examination hall.  It is, therefore,  not surprising that some invigilators could not prevent  copying and  in fact, six of them had to be warned to be careful  in future.

http://JUDIS.NIC.IN SUPREME COURT OF INDIA Page 5 of 6  

The  report  of the enquiry committee also  shows  that  the complaints  which  they  were  to  investigate  referred  to copying  on a large scale in several papers  besides  Hindi, and it is after examining all the complaints in the light of the  evidence available to them that the Committee made  its final  report;  and  in  that  report,  it  held  that   the respondent and candidate bearing Roll No. 94733 were  guilty of having used unfair means. 774   In  dealing with the question as to whether the  Committee was  justified  in  coming to this  conclusion  against  the respondent,  it  would  not be reasonable  to  exclude  from consideration  the  circumstances  under  which  the   whole enquiry  came to be hold and the general background  of  the prevailing   disturbed   and  riotous  atmosphere   in   the Examination  Hall  during  the days  that  the  High  School Examination was held at the Centre in 1960.   Unfortunately, the High Court has ignored this background altogether. Before  the  High Court, a statement was filed  showing  the seating arrangement in Room No. 10 where the respondent  was sitting for writing his answers.   It  appears that  he  was No. 3 in the 3rd row, whereas the other candidate with  Roll No.  94733 was No. 4 in the second row.  The High Court  was very  much impressed by the fact that the  respondent  could not have looked back and copied from the answer. book of the other candidate, and the High Court did not think that there was any evidence to show that the other candidate could have copied  from the respondents paper with his connivance.   We have  looked at the incorrect answers ourselves and  we  are not  prepared to hold that the identical  incorrect  answers were  given by the two candidates either by accident  or  by coincidence.    Some   of  the   incorrect   answers,   and, particularly,  the  manner in which they  have  been  given, clearly  suggest  that they were the result  of  either  one candidate copying from the other, or both candidates copying from  a  common source.  The significance of this  fact  has been  completely  missed by the High  Court.   The  question before the Enquiry Committee had to be decided by it in  the light of the nature of the incorrect answers themselves, and that  is what the Enquiry Committee has done.  It would,  we think  775 be  inappropriate in such a case to require direct  evidence to  show  that  the respondent could have  looked  back  and copied  from the answer written by the other  candidate  who was  sitting  behind him.  There was still  the  alternative possibility  that  the  candidate sitting  behind  may  have copied from the respondent with his connivance.  It is  also not unlikely that the two candidates may have talked to each other.   The atmosphere prevailing in the  Examination  Hall does  not rule out this possibility.  These are all  matters which  the Enquiry Committee had to consider, and the  fact. that  the  Enquiry  Committee did  not  write  an  elaborate report,  does  not  mean that it did not  consider  all  the relevant  facts  before it came to the conclusion  that  the respondent had used unfair’ means. In  dealing with petitions of this type, it is necessary  to bear   in  mind  that  educational  institutions  like   the Universities or appellant No. 1 set up Enquiry Committees to deal with the problem posed by the adoption of unfair  means by candidates, and normally it is within the jurisdiction of such domestic Tribunals to decide all relevant questions  in the  light  of  the evidence adduced before  them.   In  the matter of the adoption of unfair means, direct evidence  may sometimes  be  available, but cases may arise  where  direct

http://JUDIS.NIC.IN SUPREME COURT OF INDIA Page 6 of 6  

evidence  is not available and the question will have to  be considered in the light of probabilities and  circumstantial evidence.  This problem which educational institutions  have to  face from time to time is a serious- problem and  unless there  is justification to do so, courts should be  slow  to interfere with the decisions of domestic Tribunals appointed by  educational  bodies like the Universities.   In  dealing with   the  validity  of  the  impugned  orders  passed   by Universities  under Art. 226, the High Court is not  sitting in appeal over the decision in question; its jurisdiction is limited and though, 776 it  is true that if the impugned order is not  supported  by any  evidence, at all, the High Court would be justified  to quash  that  order.  But the conclusion  that  the  impugned order is not supported by any evidence must be reached after considering  the  question as to whether  probabilities  and circumstantial evidence do not justify the said  conclusion. Enquiries held by domestic Tribunals in such cases must,  no doubt, be fair and students against whom charges are  framed must  be given adequate opportunities to  defend  themselves and   in   holding  such  enquiries,  the   Tribunal,   must scrupulously follow rules of natural justice; but it  would, we  think, not be reasonable to import into these  enquiries all considerations which govern criminal trials in  ordinary courts of law.  In the present case, no animus is  suggested and  no malafides have been pleaded.  The enquiry  has  been fair and the respondent has had an opportunity of making his defence.   That  being so, we think the High Court  was  not justified  in interfering with the order passed against  the respondent. We  ought,  however, to add that though we are  inclined  to accept  the argument raised by the learned  Advocate-General against the decision of the High Court, we do not propose to make  any consequential order is favour of  the  appellants, because  the  learned Advocate General has  fairly  conceded that he does not want any such order in the present  appeal. It  appears that the respondent has, in June,  1962,  passed his Intermediate Examination and it has been fairly conceded that  there is no intention to disturb his career under  the present circumstances.  The learned Advocate-General  wanted a  decision  from us in this appeal because  he  apprehended that  the  reasoning adopted by the High  Court  in  setting aside  the  order  passed  against  the  respondent  may  be construed to mean that 777 under Art. 226, the High Court can examine the merits of the order passed by appellant No. 1 in such cases. The result is, though we agree with the appellants that  the order passed by the High Court was not justified, we refrain from setting it aside for the reasons just explained.  There would be no order as to costs.