Navaniti Prasad Singh, J.

1. This batch of writ petitions were filed challenging the validity of the Kerala Medical Education (Regulation and Control of Admission to Private Medical Educational Institutions) Ordinances (the 'Ordinances', for short) being successive Ordinance Nos. 6, 7 and 14 of 2017 as well as the provisional fixation of admission fee for all such colleges at Rs.5,00,000/- by the Admission and Fee Regulatory Committee constituted thereunder followed by challenge to the validity of the Kerala Medical Education (Regulation and Control of Admission to Private Medical Educational Institutions) Act, 2017 being Kerala Act 15 of 2017 (the 2017 Act', for short) enacted to replace a series of the Ordinances aforesaid.

2. We have heard learned Senior Counsel Sri. Sunil Gupta, who led the arguments on behalf of the writ petitioners in respect of the institutions, as also learned Senior Counsel Sri. Kurian George Kannanthanam and Sri. K. P. Dandapani, learned counsel Sri. George Poonthottam, Sri. Babu Karukappadath, Sri. George Jacob, Sri. K. M. Firoz, Sri. P. Sanjay, Sri. R. T. Pradeep and Sri. Baby Thomas. We have also heard learned counsel Sri. Santhosh Mathew, who appears on behalf of the students. On behalf of the respondents, the arguments were led by the learned Advocate General. With their consent, all the writ petitions are being disposed of at this stage itself.

3. The primal question that arises for consideration, apart from other subsidiary issues, would be with regard to the functioning and nature of power conferred by the Ordinances and the 2017 Act to fix admission fee to the MBBS/BDS Course in the private unaided Medical Colleges; the power to fix provisional fee and provisional fee fixation as it is. Equally in issue would be the provision in the Ordinances and the Act authorising the Government to enter into any agreement with one or more medical educational institutions aforesaid regarding fee or any such other matters. There are several other issues also which were raised and would be noticed at appropriate stages.

4. It would be appropriate to notice at this stage that initially when the first Ordinance in the series was issued on 10.04.2017 being Ordinance No.6 of 2017 followed by Ordinance No.7 of 2017 on 01.06.2017, followed by Ordinance No.14 of 2017 on 10.07.2017 with retrospective effect from 01.06.2017, a large number of writ petitions were filed. During the pendency of the writ petitions, on 13.07.2017, the Committee constituted therein passed a blanket order in respect of all private unaided medical colleges, fixing provisional admission fee of Rs.5,00,000/- for all such colleges, which was then challenged. In the chaotic situation created by the State, in respect of admissions to MBBS courses from time-to-time, various interim orders making interim arrangements, to bring order to the chaos created, were passed by this Court and ultimately, when the Kerala Act 15 of 2017 was brought in on 16.09.2017 with effect from 01.06.2017, fresh writ petitions were filed challenging the provisions of the 2017 Act. Why we have used the expression “chaos” as created by the State, is that the State was all along aware that admissions to MBBS Courses had to be completed by 31.08.2017 as per the orders of the Apex Court and the Notification of the Medical Council of India (MCI), which pre-supposes that the students and guardians thereof must know the financial commitment which they were to incur in respect of the Colleges they choose to take admission. The situation continues till date and absolute uncertainty still prevails in this regard. The medical colleges themselves do not know what their financial position would be nor do the students know the same.

5. We may briefly indicate the legislative history. After the decisions of the Apex Court starting from T.M.A. Pai Foundation and Others v. State of Karnataka and others [(2002) 8 SCC 481] to P.A. Inamdar and Others v. State of Maharashtra and Others [