Chennai: Finding fault with students of Dr. Ambedkar Law College for taking the law into their own hands over government's reported move to shift it, the Madras High Court today said shifting the college is a necessity as experts had said its condition was precarious and urgently needed repairs.
The First Bench, comprising Chief Justice Sanjay Kishan Kaul and Justice M M Sundresh, stated this while dismissing a PIL filed by a student or a direction to the Secretary of Law Department not to shift the college to any other location.
The students, after learning that the college would be shifted due to unsafe conditions, had resorted to a stir. Some were injured on the first day of the protest on February 4 when police resorted to lathicharge to disperse them after a road blocade.
The petitioner alleged that though there are adequate halls in the new building to conduct classes, the decision to shift the college amounted to ‘deprivation' of basic amenities.
The Bench noted that the building in question has been declared unsafe by PWD due to metro rail project or otherwise is a matter of dispute. Independent studies by experts said its condition was precarious and urgently needed repairs.
While pointing out the matter was being monitored on the judicial side by the Court, it said government had been put to notice on who would be responsbile for the consequences if any untoward incident occurs. Thereafter, they have been trying to find an alternative location to shift it to make necessary repairs.
Stating that the petitioner or students cannot act as an appellate authority over the expert body, the court said it is concerned over the apprehensive possibility of such a building in the absence of repairs, resulting in untoward incident causing loss of life or injury. “Thus there is no doubt that shifting of the college is a necessity.”
Rejecting the other contention of the petitioner that the quality of education would be affected due to the shifting, the bench said it saw no merit in the plea because it was not as if the faculty has been diminishing or methods of teaching were being changed. “Only the campus is being shifted so that the building in question can be repaired.”
Finding fault with the students for going on agitation, it said rather than taking recourse to legal remedy of approaching the court in the proceedings for clarification, the students chose to take law into their own hand.
“We refuse to believe that the students are unaware of those proceedings as every data of those proceedings are widely published in the press. It appears that when the matter of shifting was being finalized by the state government, the present agitation started,” the bench said.
The bench pointed out that it had on December, 2008 recommended that the heritage building of Law College be renovated and restored to its original status.
“Nothing prevented the students from coming to Court for seeking enforcement of those directions,” it said.
