The court upheld the Vice-Chancellor's emergency power to close the hostel due to law and order issues, but subsequent events indicated peace and control. The hostel was allowed to continue functioning, and the students admitted by the admission committee were permitted to remain. The State Administration was to be informed of any law and order issues, and the Vice-Chancellor's power to close the hostel was subject to real emergency and statutory obligations.

ORDER :

1. Oliver Mendell Holmes an eminent American Judge once spoke “life of the law has not been logic; it has been experience.” It has been stated time and again that the law does not flow on the parth of rigid and rigorous logic bereft of life but engulfs many facets of life in its very quintessence. The Courts of law have a significant and sacrosanct duty to enforce law but simultaneously are also aware of the serviceability of the institution which epitomises the majesty of law. In this context, I may profitably quote few lines from Lord Smionds in Shaw vs. Director of Public Prosecutions, (1961) 2 All ER 446:

“I entertain no doubt that there remains in the Courts of law a residual power to enforce the supreme and fundamental purpose of the law, to conserve not only the safety and order but also the moral welfare of the State.”

To elaborate the aforesaid prefatory note I recall a few memorable lines from Professor Harry Jones who stated thus:-

“There are many mansions in the house of jurisprudence, and I would not belittle anyone's perspective on law in society, provided only that he does not insist that his is the only perspective that gives a true and meaningful view of ultimate legal reality.”

2. I have referred to the aforesaid because Mr. N.S. Kale, learned senior counsel appearing for the respondent University and its functionaries submitted that in the matter of administration of the University the Vice-Chancellor subject to the provisions of the Statute has the final say and unless the decision is totally arbitrary, capricious, whimsical or fanciful or unsupported by any sense of reason, this Court should be loathe to interfere. The learned senior counsel also highlighted that if the Vice-Chancellor is not granted free play in the joints, borrowing the concept from the decision rendered by the Apex Court in the case of Tata Cellular vs. Union of India, AIR 1996 SC 11, there will be anarchy in the University and the Court of law does not permit anarchy to prevail in any institution, more so, in an academic institution. He also emphasised that this Court should not exercise its extra ordinary jurisdiction and equitable jurisdiction to interfere in the affairs of the University as that would cripple the discipline in the academic atmosphere and that would amount to creation of stiffness in the joints. To put it differently Mr. Kale, learned senior counsel has contended that in case of interference the institution would develop a neuro-immunological deficiency called ankylosis. The question that is required to be answered is whether the submission of Mr. Kale manifest ultimate legal reality or there is something more to it?

3. Now to the essential facts of the case. The three petitioners have visited this Court assailing the action of the respondent No. 2 whereby he had passed the order for closing the hostel called “Devendra Hostel” after getting the inmates evicted. It is asseverated in the petition that the petitioner No. 1 is a student of M.Sc. (Physics), IIIrd Semester and he has been staying in the hostel from the date of the joining his studies in the University. It is setforth that he hails from Himachal Pradesh and has been prosecuting his studies in Rani Durgavati Vishwavidyalaya. The petitioner no. 2 is a student of M.Sc. of the 1st Semester. He belongs to Manipur State and has taken admission in the University. The petitioner No. 3 is in the IVth Semester of M.Sc. (Physics). All of them have been staying in the hostel in question. It is averred in the petition that the University commenced the academic session from 1-7-2000. Some of the students along with petitioners submitted their forms for renewal of their admission in the hostel for the academic session 2000-2001 after getting the same forwarded by the Heads of the concerned departments. The Warden of the Hostel permitted them to deposit their hostel