The court established that horizontal reservations in national institutions must not undermine meritocracy and must comply with constitutional equality principles.

JUDGMENT

B.V. Nagarathna, J. - Since, these writ petitions raise common questions of law and facts, they have been connected together, heard at length and disposed of by this common order.

2. Writ Petition No.8788 of 2020 has been filed by a student who is a resident of Bengaluru for about eight years and has completed his school education from Florence Public School and MES Kishora Kendra, Bengaluru, while Writ Petition No.8951 of 2020 is a public interest litigation filed by two former students of the National Law School of India University, Bengaluru (hereinafter referred to as "respondent/Law School" or "respondent/Law University" for the sake of convenience). Writ Petition No.9145 of 2020 has been filed by the Bar Council of India (hereinafter referred to as "BCI" for the sake of convenience), a statutory body constituted, governed and functioning under the provisions of the Advocates Act, 1961 (hereinafter referred to as "the 1961 Act" for short), through its Secretary.

3. In all these writ petitions, the petitioners have assailed the vires of the National Law School of India (Amendment) Act, 2020 (Karnataka Act No.13 of 2020) (hereinafter referred to as "the Amendment Act", for short) as being unconstitutional, illegal and ultra vires. There is also a challenge to the revised seat matrix in B.A., LL.B. (Hons.) and LL.M. programmes issued by the respondent/Law School, vide Notification dated 04.08.2020.

BRIEF FACTS :

In W.P.No.8788 of 2020:

4. The petitioner herein has stated that he is a resident of Bengaluru for about eight years and has completed his schooling in two institutions in Bengaluru. That he has registered for appearing in the Common Law Admission Test (hereinafter referred to as "the CLAT" for short) for the year 2020 in order to seek admission to the respondent/Law School for his five years B.A., LL.B. (Hons.) undergraduate programme pursuant to the Notification issued by the respondent/Law School. The petitioner has challenged the vires of the Amendment Act, which provides 25% horizontal reservation by way of institutional preference for students who have studied in any recognized educational institution in Karnataka for a period of at least ten years preceding the date of qualifying examination, by insertion of sub-section (3) to Section 4 of the National Law School of India Act, 1986 (Karnataka Act No.22 of 1986) (hereinafter referred to as "the Act" for short), a copy of which is produced at Annexure E to the writ petition.

5. According to the petitioner, the respondent/Law School has no power to provide for any kind of horizontal reservation (institutional or residential- based) in view of the law laid down by the Hon'ble Supreme Court in P.A. Inamdar vs. State of Maharashtra, (2005) 6 SCC 537 (P.A. Inamdar). That the petitioner learnt from newspaper reports that domicile based reservation for students of Karnataka by way of an amendment was passed by the Karnataka State Legislature providing 50% reservation but, the same was returned by the Hon'ble Governor of Karnataka on the ground that such regional reservation could not be accepted. Thereafter, the Karnataka Legislature has passed the impugned Amendment Act introducing 25% horizontal reservation by way of institutional preference for students who have studied from any recognized educational institutions in Karnataka for a period of at least ten years preceding the date of qualifying examination by amending Section 4 of the Act.

6. According to the petitioner, the concept of institutional preference at the level of under-graduation in a professional course is unknown to law. That the respondent/Law School is an institution of national significance. It is a premier institution for excellence in legal education in India as well as in South Asia. The admission to the said institution must be on merit-based selection of students and satisfy the twin test of reasonable classification within the contours of Article 14 of the Constitution of India. The no