JUDGMENT

Shah, J.-Leave granted.

2. Heard learned counsel for the parties exhaustively.

3. These appeals are filed by the Union of India and the Medical Council of India respectively. It is to be stated that Medical Council has not recommended for grant of permission to establish medical college, yet Medical Council was not joined as a party respondent in the petition before the High Court.

4. Normally, this Court would hesitate to interfere with an interlocutory order, but in a case where prima facie it appears that the said order cannot be justified by any judicial standard, the ends of justice and the need to maintain judicial discipline requires us to do so and to indicate the reasons for such interference without prejudice to the rights of one side or the other.

5. It is unfortunate that the High Court of Allahabad (R.H. Zaidi and Bhanwar Singh, JJ) exercised the extra-ordinary jurisdiction under Article 226 of the Constitution of India, in an extra-ordinary manner by granting interim mandatory relief to run Medical College, despite the fact that the Central Government has rejected such permission, after obtaining recommendation from the Medical Council twice. The extra-ordinary powers under Article 226 are to be exercised for rendering justice in accordance with law. Medical College cannot be established except with the previous sanction of the Central Government as provided under the Indian Medical Council Act, 1956 (102 of 1956). Unfortunately, by granting this interim mandatory order, without allowing the respondents therein time to file counter affidavit, the Court not only violated the norms for grant of interim relief, but has also violated the principles of natural justice and has allowed the petition on the date of its admission. It is apparent that on the day when the petition was presented, the Court straightaway granted mandatory order permitting respondent No. 1 to establish the Medical College. Learned counsel who appeared on behalf of the Union of India sought an adjournment for filing an affidavit in reply after obtaining instructions from the concerned Department, but the same was refused. This unusual relief was granted in a case where respondent No. 1 filed an application for consent of the Central Government to establish the Medical College at Lucknow in January, 1997. That application was considered, re-considered and the Medical Council had carried out the inspection twice and finally on 4.6.1999 application was rejected by the Central Government. In hot haste, in a case where there was no urgency, the High Court by the impugned order dated 11.10.1999 directed that operation of the impugned order dated 4.6.1999 passed by the Central Government shall be stayed and the State of U.P. was directed to allocate the students to the medical college for the purpose of admission. As such, it is to be stated that by granting stay of the order passed by the Central Government it is difficult to hold that that would amount to a permission to establish the medical college.

6. May be that Order XXXIX of the C.P.C. would not be applicable at the stage of granting interim relief in a petition under Article 226 or 227 of the Constitution, but at the same time various principles laid down under Order XXXIX for granting ad interim or interim reliefs are required to be taken into consideration. In the case of Morgan Stanley Mutual Fund v. Kartick Das1, after considering the various authorities this Court laid down the guiding principles in relation to grant of an ad interim injunction which are as under :

"As a principle, ex parte injunction could be granted only under exceptional circumstances. The factors which should weigh with the Court in the grant of ex parte injunction are-

(a) whether irreparable or serious mischief will ensue to the plaintiff.

(b) whether the refusal of ex parte injunction would involve greater injustice than the grant of it would involve;

(c) the cour