JUDGMENT :- This and the three companion Special Appeals arise out of a judgment disposing of four writ petitions. They all raise common questions and can be conveniently disposed of together.

2. On December 23, 1965 the State Government in its Education Department addressed a demi order to the Director of Education U. P. It informed the Director that the Governor has been pleased to order that with effect from July, 1966, the minimum age limit for admission to class VI in all the recognised educational institutions in the State shall be 9 years on July 1 of the year in which admission to class VI is sought. Consequently at the High School stage, the minimum age limit for all students appearing at the High School Examination of 1971 onwards, shall be 14 years on July 1 of the year in which the student appears at the High School Examination of the Board of High School and Intermediate Education. The Director was asked to take immediate action to notify this decision to all the educational officers and institutions concerned and to request the Board of High School and Intermediate Education, U. P. to take suitable action for the amendment of the Board's Regulations.

3. As a result of this directive, the Education Code was amended. Clause (E) was added to paragraph 90 thereof providing for a restriction for admission to class VI at the minimum age of 9 years. In due course, the Board by Notification dated 21st February, 1966 added Regulation 33 to Chapter XII of the Regulations made by it under the U. P. Intermediate Education Act. It provided that no candidate shall be eligible for admission to the High School Examination of 1971 and onwards unless his/ her age on the 1st July of the year in which he/she intends to appear at the examination is 14 years or more.

4. The respondents in these appeals sought admission to the High School Examination held in 1972. Their applications were rejected by the Board on the ground that they were below 14 years in age. One of the respondents was, however, given the admission card but subsequently his examination was cancelled on the same ground.

5. The respondents filed writ petitions to challenge the validity of Regulation 33. Our brother G. C. Mathur held that the basis of classification for appearing in the High School Examination on the ground of age has no nexus with the object sought to be achieved by the law. Regulation violated Article 14 of the Constitution. On this view, the writ petitions were allowed and the Board was restrained from disentitling the respondents from appearing at the Examination on the ground that they were below age. Aggrieved the Board of High School and Intermediate Education, U. P. has come up in appeal.

6. In the writ petitions, the validity of Regulation 33 was challenged on the ground that there was no reasonable basis for debarring students below the age of 14 years from appearing at the High School Examination. The grouping together of all students below the age of 14 into a separate class, which was ineligible for the High School Examination was arbitrary and had no rational relation to the object sought to be achieved by the U. P. Intermediate Education Act.

7. The State filed a supplementary counter-affidavit to indicate the basis upon which the State has classified the students below the age of 14 years. This affidavit refers to the Reports of the Kothari Commission and the Mudaliar Commission. Neither of these two Commissions recommended a rigid fixation of age limit as a qualification for the High School Examination. They recommended an integrated system of education commensurate with the age of the students. Mudaliar Commission Report provides that particular care will have to be taken to ensure that the education imparted during the first 8 years in the Primary (or Junior Basic) and the Middle (Senior Basic) stage forms an integrated and complete whole, so that when free and compulsory education is extended upto the age of 14, as envisaged in the Constit

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