S. Ravindra Bhat, J.

1. The present writ petition questions the Constitutionality of two sets of actions. The petitioners firstly challenge the validity of Section 13 of the Delhi Professional Colleges or Institutions (Prohibition of Capitation Fee, Regulation of Admission, Fixation on Non- Exploitative Fee and Other Measures to Ensure Equity and Excellence) Act, 2007 (“the Act”) as violating their rights under Articles 14 and Article 19(1)(g) of the Constitution, and secondly, various actions of the Guru Govind Singh Indraprastha University (hereinafter “GGSIP University”), the Respondent, a University created by statute enacted by the Delhi Legislative Assembly, prescribing the rules for admission to the various sub-colleges are questioned against those constitutional provisions. This case essentially revolves around the authority of the State, whether through an act of the legislature or through Article 12 authorities such as the GGSIP University, to regulate admissions in private unaided colleges.

2. It is useful at the outset, to present a picture the various legislative and regulatory actions that are the subject-matter of the present proceedings, and how they relate to the GGSIP University and its affiliated institutions. The actions of the Respondent which have led to this constitutional challenge can be divided into two parts. The first is Section 13 of the Act that reads:

“An institution shall, subject to the provisions of the Act, make admission through a common entrance test to be conducted by the designated agency, in such manner, as may be prescribed: Provided that the management seats may be advertised and filled up, from the candidates who have qualified the common entrance test, by the institution in a transparent manner based on the merit at the qualifying examination.”

The ‘common entrance test’ (“the CET”) is further defined in Section 3(d) of the Act as “the entrance test conducted for determination of merit of the candidates followed by centralized counselling for the purpose of merit based admission to an institution through a single window procedure by the designated agency.”

A ‘designated agency’ is defined in Section 3(g) as “an agency, designated by the Government, for conducting the common entrance test and counselling for admissions in the institutions.” This statutory policy of a CET is also reflected in Clause 21 of the Delhi Government’s notification No.DHE-4(61)/2010-11/304 dated 6.5.2011 issued by the Directorate of Higher Education.

3. The Government of NCT of Delhi – acting under Section 4 of the Act – accordingly appointed GGSIP University as the designated agency for conducting the CET and allotting the students to the various colleges/institutions through Open House Counselling. The members of petitioner association (hereafter called “the Association” – an association of self financing institutions affiliated to associated with the GGSIP University)– are accordingly mandatorily required to admit students from the merit list prepared by the University after conducting the CET. In this, the association complains that seats are falling vacant in the BBA programme for want to CET qualified students, and a statutory injunction operates against them from employing independent standards for admission of students in such cases. The Association thus claims that its members are not being permitted to – contrary to their constitutional rights under Articles 14 and 19(1)(g) – fill vacant seats by adopting any other fair, transparent and merit based method, in the event the CET does not provide a sufficient number of candidates.

4. The second set of regulations challenged in these proceedings relate to admissions guidelines and procedures of the GGSIP University. The Association seeks directions aimed at ensuring that the seats for the BBA programme in its member colleges do not go empty through the academic year. For this, the Association first challenges a notification of the Directorate