IMPORTANT POINT
An institution upon the affairs of which the State exercises a deep and pervasive control is a State within the meaning of Article 12 of the Constitution.

JUDGMENT

S.B. Sinha, J. —

1. Leave granted.

2. The short question which arises for consideration herein is as to whether the Uttar Pradesh Ganna Kishan Sansthan (for short “the Sansthan”), a society registered under the Societies Registration Act is a ‘State’ within the meaning of Article 12 of the Constitution of India.

3. Indisputably, before constituting the Sansthan, its functions, viz., imparting of knowledge and training to the cane-growers and connected persons so as to effect increase in the production of sugar in the State was being performed by the Cane Development Department. The Sansthan was established by a Government Order dated 4.08.1975. The State had established training centers at Shahjahanpur, Muzaffarnagar and Gorakhpur. These training centers, as noticed hereinbefore, were being run by the Cane Development Department of the Government of Uttar Pradesh. Management of the said training centers was transferred to the Sansthan. The expenses thereof were to be met from U.P. Sahkari Ganna Samiti Sangh and Sakkar Vishesh Nidhi.

4. Respondent was appointed in the post of Computer Officer/ Data Processing Officer. The Governing Council of the Sansthan in its meeting held on 28.04.1997 resolved to abolish the posts created and to cancel the appointments made, pursuant whereto the services of the respondent were dispensed with by an order dated 17.05.1997.

Feeling aggrieved by the said order dated 17.05.1997, he filed a writ petition before the Lucknow Bench of the High Court of Judicature at Allahabad being Writ Petition No. 869 of 1998 wherein one of the issues raised was whether the Sansthan is a ‘State’ within the meaning of Article 12 of the Constitution of India.

5. The writ petition filed by the respondent came up for consideration before a Division Bench of the High Court. It noticed an earlier decision of another Division Bench of the said Court wherein it was opined that the appellant No. 2 is not a ‘State’ within the meaning of Article 12 of the Constitution of India. However, a different view was taken.

The question as to whether the Sansthan would answer the description of a ‘State’ within the meaning of Article 12 of the Constitution of India was, therefore, referred to a Full Bench of the High Court.

The Full Bench held that the Sansthan being an authority would come within the purview of definition of ‘State’ within the meaning of Article 12 of the Constitution of India.

6. Article 12 of the Constitution of India reads as under:

“12. Definition.—In this part, unless the context otherwise requires, ‘the State’ includes the Government and Parliament of India and the Government and the legislature of each of the States and all local or other authorities within the territory of India or under the control of the Government of India.”

7. Law in this behalf has developed a lot. With the changing societal conditions, a large number of bodies exercising public functions have been brought within the purview of the definition of ‘State’. We need not dilate on the development of law in this regard in view of the decisions rendered by this Court beginning from Rajasthan State Electricity Board v. Mohan Lal1 [(1967) 3 SCR 377], Ajay Hasia v. Khalid Mujib Sehravardi2 [(1981) 1 SCC 722] and other decisions including a Seven - Judge Bench decision of this Court in Pradeep Kumar Biswas v. Indian Institute of Chemical Biology3 [(2002) 5 SCC 111].

8. We may also notice that P.K. Ramachandra Iyer and Others v. Union of India and Others4 [(1984) 2 SCC 141] wherein Indian Council for Agricultural Research (ICAR) was held to be a ‘State’ within the meaning of Article 12 of the Constitution of India, was distinguished in Chander Mohan Khanna v. National Council of Educational Research and Training5 [(1991) 4 SCC 578]. However, Chander Mohan Khanna (supra) was overruled in Pradeep Kumar Biswas (supra) to the extent it followed the decision in Sabhajit Tewary v. Union of India6 [(1975) 1 SCC 485].

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