IMPORTANT POINT
The court established that corrections of obvious mistakes in school records are permissible under Rule 26.4 of the Secondary School Code, and misinterpretation of these rules by authorities can lead to unjust outcomes.

JUDGMENT/ORDER

PRITHVIRAJ K. CHAVAN, J. - Rule. Rule made returnable forthwith. Learned AGP waives service.

2. By consent, taken up forthwith for final disposal.

3. The petitioner is aggrieved with the impugned order of the respondent no.1, who declined to correct his date of birth in the Leaving Certificate as well as mark-sheet of HSC examination and all consequential documents thereafter.

4. The date of birth of the petitioner is 7/6/1997 which has been recorded with the Nagpur Municipal Corporation under the provisions of Registration of Birth and Death Act, 1969. The petitioner was admitted at Indira Primary School at Nagpur for his primary school education. His date of birth has been correctly mentioned in the school record. Thereafter, the petitioner was admitted at respondent no.5 - Saraswati Vidyalaya, Nagpur for his further studies on 11/5/2006. At the time of his admission in the said school, his date of birth was incorrectly recorded as 7/6/1996 instead of 7/6/1997. In order to pursue further education, the petitioner took admission on 31/7/2012 for prosecuting his 11th and 12th Standard. For that purpose, he was admitted in the respondent no.4 High School and Junior College. He passed 12th Standard examination in February, 2014.

5. In the Leaving Certificate, the date of birth which was incorrectly mentioned by respondent no.5 was pursuant to his earlier school record by the respondent no.4.

6. The petitioner thereafter took admission in the respondent no.3 Engineering College for prosecuting his studies in B.E. (Information Technology) which was a 4 years course. During his engineering education, the petitioner learnt about the incorrect entry in respect of his date of birth in school record by Saraswati Vidyalaya.

7. He, therefore, approached the concerned authorities of respondent no.5 - Saraswati Vidyalaya as well as respondent no.2 - Maharashtra State, Board of Secondary and Higher Secondary, Pune, Office at Nagpur in order to correct the mistake. The respondent no.5 corrected the date of birth and accordingly issued Leaving Certificate on 20/2/2020 in favour of petitioner indicating that the correct date of birth of the petitioner is 7/6/1997.

8. Based on the corrected School record, respondent no.2 had issued corrected SSC examination certificate by mentioning his correct date of birth as 7/6/1997. The respondent no.3 had forwarded proposal of correcting the date of birth of the petitioner in the 12th examination record.

9. However, by the impugned communication dtd. 8/9/2020, respondent no.1 i.e. Deputy Director of Education, Nagpur has turned down the request of the petitioner citing the reason that correction in date of birth is not permissible in view of Rule 26.3 of the Secondary Schools Code.

10. We have heard learned Counsel for the petitioner and the learned AGP.

11. The present petition is covered by a decision of the co-ordinate bench of this Court (Coram : R.K. Deshpande and Vinay Joshi, JJ) in Writ Petition No.2126 of 2017 in the case of Kailash S/o Vitthalrao Verulkar Vs. Deputy Director of Education, Amravati Division, Amravati and Ors., dtd. 19/10/2018.

12. The learned AGP is ad idem with the petitioner on the said issue. Nevertheless, a bare look at the impugned communication dtd. 8/9/2020 itself indicates that respondent no.1 had misinterpreted the provisions of Rule 26.3 of the Secondary School Code.

13. Bare look at Annexure-A, which is birth certificate of the petitioner indicates his date of birth as 7/6/1997. His school leaving certificate issued by Indira Primary School also reveals his date of birth as 7/6/1997. The only error appears to have been committed by respondent no.5 in the Leaving Certificate of the petitioner, wherein his date of birth has been shown as 7/6/1996, which continued in the leaving certificate issued by respondent no.4.

14. Even, the certificate issued by the respondent no.2 correctly mentions the date of birth of the petitioner as 7/6/1997.

15. The respondent n