Societies running educational institutions and entitled to income tax exemption are not required to pay additional FAR charges for upgrading their schools to senior secondary level.

JUDGMENT :

1. The petitioner, a society registered under the Societies Registration Act, 1860, comprising approximately 300 private unaided recognised schools in Delhi, seeks, by means of this writ petition, to espouse the cause of various primary and middle schools, who, consequent to modified recognition granted by the DoE and the CBSE, are functioning at the senior secondary level. The schools claim to be aggrieved by the demand, by the DDA, for payment, by the said schools, of additional charges, for being allowed the facility of additional Floor Area Ratio (FAR). In other words, the claim of the petitioner is that the members of the petitioner should be allowed to run as senior secondary schools, without requiring payment, by them, of any additional charges, to the DDA.

2. The petitioner’s case is that, despite clear cut instructions, having been circulated by the respondent-Delhi Development Authority (DDA), allowing such upgradation, subject to the schools having the requisite land area, the DDA is, for no justifiable reason, refusing such upgradation until and unless additional charges are paid, by the said schools, for being allowed additional FAR, which such upgradation would entail.

3. The petitioner contends that the demand for additional FAR charges, as raised by the DDA, has no legs to stand on, and is, in fact, contrary, not only to the notification and instructions issued by the DDA itself, but also to orders passed by this Court as well as the Supreme Court.

4. Having thus set out the issue in conspectus, the facts may, to the extent necessary, be set out thus

Facts

5. Plots were allotted, by the DDA, to the Societies, whose cause this writ petition espouses, for setting up primary and middle schools, under the Delhi Development Authority (Disposal of Developed Nazal Lands) Rules, 1981.

6. The petitioner contends that the premium payable, to the DDA, at the time of allotment of plots, was the same for all educational institutions, irrespective of the level thereof, i.e. irrespective of whether they were primary, middle, secondary or senior secondary.

7. The said premium, it is pointed out, was paid by the societies.

8. On 1st August, 1990, the Master Plan for Delhi (MPD) 2001 came into force. Under the MPD 2001, the area required, for establishing nursery, primary and secondary/senior secondary schools, as well as the FAR and ground coverage permitted to such schools, was stipulated thus:

9. The writ petition candidly concedes that, till the coming into force of the subsequent MPD viz. the MPD 2021, the stand of the DDA was that, under the MPD 2001, separate standards had been stipulated for different categories of schools, and that it was consciously decided to allot specific sites depending on the use to which the sites were to be put, depending on the category of school to be established thereon. As such, the DDA was of the view, at that point of time, that, on a site, which had been leased by the DDA for establishing a school of a particular category/level, no school, of any higher category/level, could be established or run. In other words, a site which was allotted for establishing a primary school could not, in any circumstances, be used for setting up a middle, secondary or senior secondary school.

10. As such, vide circular dated 8th May, 2003, the DoE directed that applications, by societies, seeking upgradation of the category of school, above the category for which, expressly, land had been allotted to them, were not to be entertained.

11. On 12th January, 2014, a meeting took place in the office of Hon’ble Lieutenant Governor (hereinafter ref