JUDGMENT :

Ashutosh Kumar, J.

Heard Mr. Satyabir Bharti, learned Advocate for the appellant the Bihar School Examination Board and Mr. Sunil Singh for the respondent Jagdhar Ray Uchchtar Madhyamik Vidyalaya. The State is represented by Mr. Priyadarshi Matri Sharan.

2. A direction had been sought by the aforesaid school, namely, Jagdhar Ray Uchchtar Madhyamik Vidyalaya (hereinafter called the school) in the district of Vaishali to the Bihar School Examination Board to grant affiliation in its favour for Intermediate Science, Intermediate Arts and Intermediate Commerce courses from academic session 2017-19.

3. The learned Single Judge by his Judgment dated 19.09.2018, after examining the entire scheme of the Bihar School Examination Board Act, 1952 and the Bihar School Examination Board (Senior Secondary) Affiliation Regulation, 2011, found that once the affiliation committee of the Board recommends for grant of affiliation, the Board has no option in the matter and has to pass an order on the basis of such recommendation of the committee of affiliation.

4. In the case of the respondent-school, there appears to be a favourable report of the affiliation committee for grant of affiliation by the Board but before any decision regarding affiliation could be taken by the Board, an order was issued cancelling such affiliation.

5. There is a history behind this litigation.

6. Many institutions desirous of being affiliated with the Bihar School Examination Board for running courses under various streams had preferred requisite applications and after the physical inspections of such schools, the affiliation committee of the Board had made recommendations in favour of those schools. Before the same could be considered by the Board for taking decision with respect to affiliation of such institutions, a Public Interest Litigation came to be filed in the High Court, bringing to the fore several inconsistencies and wrong recommendations and consequent wrong affiliations to even such schools which did not exist or which did not have the requisite infrastructure to make them eligible for affiliation.

7. During this period, the post of the Chairman of the Board also underwent a change.

8. The State of Bihar, during that period, had also witnessed lot of furore with respect to a scam of a forty years old person topping in the Board examination which had brought a bad name to the system of education in the State.

9. Forced by this, the current dispensation of the Board thought it appropriate to have a fresh inspection of such schools for taking a decision regarding affiliation of such institutions.

10. A five member team was constituted by the Board for making physical inspection of such schools, which submitted its report, which in essence was different from the recommendation of the Affiliation Committee. A stock decision was taken by the Board after the report that any affiliation granted to such schools which were not found to be having sufficient/requisite infrastructure be cancelled or the affiliation withdrawn. In the process, even when the affiliation to the respondent school had not been granted and the same was pending consideration, the name of the school fell in the list of such schools whose affiliation was also shown to have been cancelled on the basis of such inspection report.

11. A primary grievance was raised on behalf of the respondent school that before any affiliation could be granted to an institution, there was no occasion to pass any order cancelling or withdrawing the same.

12. Mr. Satyabir Bharti, learned Advocate for the Board admits that when such orders were being passed by it with respect to many schools which were found to be deficient in infrastructure and other facilities for them to be eligible for being affiliated, some mistakes had crept and so was in the case of the respondent school.

13. Be that as it may, the learned Single Judge, on perusal of Section 10B and 10C of the Bihar School Examination Board Act, 1952 found that