The main legal point established in the judgment is that economic disparity alone cannot be the sole basis for rejecting a kidney transplantation request, and the Act's provisions are regulatory, not prohibitive, allowing for consideration of humanitarian grounds for donation.

VINEY MITTAL, J.

1. Petitioner, Rajinder Kumar, has approached this Court through the present petition filed under Article 226 of the Constitution of India. The prayer made in the petition is for issuance of a writ of certiorari for quashing orders dated September 27, 2004 and October 14/27, 2004 passed by respondent No. 3, Chairman, Au-thorisation Committee, and respondent No. 2, Secretary Medical Education and Research, respectively. The petitioner has pleaded that he is suffering from a complete kidney failure. He was advised the transplantation of the aforesaid organ. On an earlier occasion, wife of the petitioner had donated her one kidney. However, the aforesaid transplantation of the organ was not successful and, therefore, the petitioner was medically advised to go in for a fresh transplantation of the kidney. The petitioner found a willing donor, Jeewan Sharma. As per the requirement of the Transplantation of Human Organs Act, 1994 (hereinafter referred to as the Act"), in case the donor of a human organ is not related to the recipient, approval of the Authorisation Committee constituted under the Act is required. Since the aforesaid proposed donor, Jeewan Sharma was not related to the petitioner, therefore, necessary permission from the Authorisation Committee was sought by the petitioner and the donor. For the aforesaid purpose, the petitioner as well as the donor filed their respective affidavits. Along with that, various medical test reports of the petitioner were also placed on record, along with certificates issued by the surgeon who was to conduct surgery upon the petitioner. An affidavit of Shrimati Rita Sharma, wife of the proposed donor was also filed. A meeting of the authorisation committee was held on September 27, 2004. The Authorisation Committee found that the proposed donor and his wife were not related to the petitioner, in any manner, but were working as servants in the house of the petitioner. On that basis, it was inferred that since there was a great economic disparity between the recipient and the donor, doner and his wife being servants of the recipient s family, "the money involvement cannot be ruled out". Accordingly, the request of the petitioner seeking the approval was rejected by the Au-thorisation Committee. A copy of the aforesaid minutes of the meeting of Authorisation Committee dated September 27, 2004 is appended as Annexure P/12 with the present petition.

2. The petitioner approached Secretary, Medical Education and Research, respondent No. 2, by way of appeal under Section 17 of the Act. It was submitted by the petitioner that his wife Rakesh Kumari had already donated her one kidney in the past and, therefore, none of the close relatives of the recipient was in a position to donate the kidney. The affidavits of the proposed donor as well as his wife were also placed on the record. The matter was considered by respondent No. 2 and the prayer of the petitioner was rejected by making the following observations :

"The learned counsel of Shri Rajinder Kumar submitted that the donor Jewan Sharma and Rajinder Kumar recipient were living in the same lane. Even if his contention is accepted, it would not materially affect the case. The recipient and donor have failed to establish that the kidney was being donated out of love and affection. The recipient was living abroad in 2002. He has reportedly come back to India due to his illness. The donor Mr. Jeewan Sharma does not have any regular job. Both he and his wife are doing part time manual jobs. They are not related to the recipient in any manner nor has it been brought on record as to what motivated him to donate his kidney and why he was trying to help the family. I accordingly feel that the requirements of Section 9(3) of Transplantation of Human Organs Act, 1994 are not met. The appeal is accordingly rejected."

3. A copy of order dated October 14/27, 2004 has been appended as Annexure P/13 with the petition. The petitioner has