AICTE lacks authority to prohibit the use of 'National' in institution names, as regulations cannot apply retrospectively without explicit legislative power.

JUDGMENT :

1. By administrative order, the W.P. (MD) No. 21453 of 2023 is posted alongwith Writ Appeal.

2. Counter has been filed in both the cases and common argument and common judgment were rendered.

3. For the sake of convenience, the petitioner is referred to as “Petitioner College”.

4. The brief factual matrix of the case that are required for the disposal of this writ petition in netshell are as under:-

4.1 The petitioner/Institution, namely “National Engineering College” was established by the National Educational and Charitable Trust, registered under the Trust Registration Act, under Regn. No. 180 of 1984. The Government of Tamil Nadu, vide G.O.Ms. No. 939 dated 20.07.1984, granted permission to the said Trust to start an Engineering College in the name and style “National Engineering College” at Kovilpatti, under the Self Financing Scheme in order to cater the needs of rural area people, from the academic year 1984-1985 and thereafter, on 11.10.1984, the Madurai Kamarajar University had granted affiliation as well as permission to start Under Graduate Courses in Mechanical Engineering, Electronics and Communication Engineering and Computer Science with an intake of 60 students in each discipline.

4.2 The College was started in the academic year 1984-1985 after obtaining necessary permission/approval/affiliation. The Government, vide Letter dated 04.08.1992, had granted three permissions to the petitioner College to start Electrical and Electronics Engineering with an intake of 60 students and Electronics and Instrumentation Engineering with an intake of 30 students and the petitioner/College was affiliated upto the year 1992 with the Madurai Kamaraj University.

4.3 In the interregnum, the All India Council for Technical Education [AICTE] Act, 1987 [Central Act 52 of 1987] came into force on 28.08.1988 vide G.O.Ms.No.317 [E] dated 26.03.1988.

4.4 The AICTE had also granted permission to the petitioner/College on 19.08.1993 by approving the existing courses recognised by Madurai Kamaraj University and the very same Council had accorded permission to conduct two additional courses, viz., Electronics and Instrumentation Engineering and Electrical and Electronics Engineering with an intake of 40 students in each discipline, after getting necessary permission/approval from the Government of Tamil Nadu.

4.5 After the formation of Manonmaniyam Sundaranar University in the year 1992, the said University has also granted affidavits for conducting courses in the very name and style and it was also followed by an increase in intake of students from 40 to 60 by AICTE for Electronics and Instrumentation Engineering and Electrical and Electronics Engineering and not stopping with that, the petitioner / Institution has started Master of Computer Application [MCA] with an intake of 30 students and it was increased from 30 to 60 from the academic year 1997-1998 and the AICTE had accorded permission to do so and further, granted permission to start M.E. [Computer Science and Engineering] with an intake of 25 students from the academic year 2001-2002 and the Under Graduate Courses, viz., Information and Technology Course with an intake of 60 students from the academic year 2009-2010.

4.6 It is the specific case of the petitioner that the College, viz., the National Engineering College, is functioning from the academic year 1984-1985 onwards and after the introduction of the AICTE Act, the said Body had also continued to grant permission/approval to the existing courses and also permitted the Institution to start the Under Graduate Courses and Post Graduate Courses in certain disciplines, having aware of the fact that it uses the word “National.”

5.1 As stated supra, the All India Council, after inspection by an expert committee had granted approval vide communication dated 19.08.1993 to National Engineering College. The approval granted by AICTE was periodicall