JUDGMENT

SHAJI P. CHALY, J.

The captioned writ appeal is filed by the petitioner in the writ petition challenging the judgment dated 30.10.2020 in W.P.(C) No. 19593 of 2020, by which the following reliefs sought for in the writ petition were declined: 1. To issue a writ of mandamus or such other writ directing the consideration of Ext.P10 application by the first respondent and order granting consent of affiliation (COA) by the first respondent within the time limit set by Ext.P9.

2. To issue a writ of mandamus or such other writ directing the first respondent to keep its web portal open for a specified number of days, so as to receive the online application to be performed by the petitioner.

2. Brief material facts for the disposal of the writ appeal are as follows: The appellant submitted Exts. P4 to P8 applications for accommodating three additional students in 5 specializations in Master of Dental Surgery (M.D.S) for the academic year 2021-2022 before the Secretary to Government of India, Health and Family Welfare, New Delhi. The appellant had remitted the requisite fee by way of demand draft, which was produced along with the application. The Dental Council of India i.e., the second respondent, as per Ext.P9 letter dated 18.09.2020, directed the appellant to produce the consent of affiliation from the University within 10 days.

Thereupon, the appellant submitted Ext. P10 application before the Kerala University of Health Sciences, the first respondent, requesting to open their web portal for enabling it to submit its application for getting consent of affiliation from the University. It is an admitted fact that the University had not invited applications for starting new Dental Colleges or for increasing the seats in the existing colleges for the academic year 2021-2022. According to the appellant, since no action was taken, the appellant was constrained to file the writ petition, which was dismissed. It is also submitted that as per Annexure A judgment dated 18- 09 -2020 in W.P.(C) No. 16098 of 2020, a learned single Judge of this Court directed the University to get their web portal open for three days from 22.09.2020. Anyhow, while the writ petition was pending, as per Ext.P13 letter dated 14.10.2020, the Dental Council of India directed the appellant to produce the consent of affiliation within 7 days. These are the basic background facts available for the disposal of the appeal.

3. The University has filed a statement in the writ petition refuting the allegations and the claims and demands raised by the appellant. It is stated that in terms of the Regulations framed for the grant of letter of permission from the Central Government for the Dental courses, an applicant college is duty bound to submit the application along with the consent of affiliation issued by the concerned University, and that it is settled law that an incomplete application submitted is liable to be rejected at the initial stage itself as is held by the Apex Court in Royal Medical Trust v. Union of India [(2015) 10 SCC 19) that the initial assessment of the application at the first level should comprise of checking necessary requirements, such as essentiality certificate, consent for affiliation and physical features like land and hospital requirement etc. Therefore, according to the learned counsel, if an applicant fails to fulfil those requirements, the application on the face of it would be incomplete and the same is to be rejected and those who fulfil the basic requirements would be considered at the next stage. That apart, it was submitted that the processing of an application for consent of affiliation includes the inspection of the institution to verify the infrastructure available and in terms of the judgments rendered by the Apex Court, every inspection should have an element of surprise.

4. The sum and substance of the contention put forth by the University is that the benefit of surprise inspection could be achieved only if there is sufficie