JUDGMENT
S.B. Sinha, C.J.
1. An interesting question which arises for consideration in this appeal is as to whether the Roman Catholics can claim themselves to be Christian minority vis–vis another set of Christians namely Protestants.
2. A Writ Petition was filed by one Mr. M. David, 1st respondent herein, praying for issuance of a writ of mandamus directing the respondents in the writ petition to admit him to B.Tech. (Computers) course in the minority institution run by the respondents 4 and 5 for the academic year 2000-2001.
3. The 1st respondent-writ petitioner herein is an Indian Christian professing Protestant Faith. He passed Intermediate Examination in second division with M.P.C. group from St. Mary’s Junior College, Himayathnagar, Hyderabad. He appeared for the EAMCEt-2000 examination, a common entrance test conducted for admission into Medical, Engineering and Agricultural Courses, in which he has secured 48615th rank. He intended to prosecute B.E. (Computers) Engineering course in one of the Engineering institutions run by Christian Minority Community. On or about 21.7.2000, the appellants herein issued a notification inviting applications from candidates belonging to Catholic Christian Minority qualified in EAMCET-2000/ECET-2000 for admission into various engineering courses in the institution run by them. The 1st appellant refused to issue application to the writ petitioner on the ground that he professes protestant faith and not roman catholic faith. The petitioner made a representation to the 2nd respondent in the Writ Petition whereupon directions were given to the appellants to issue application form to the petitioner, pursuant whereto, he could file his application. But, his application was rejected on the ground that he professes protestant faith.
4. The learned single Judge at the time of admission directed the appellants herein to admit the petitioner into B.Tech., (Computers) Course as per the rank assigned to him in EAMCET-2000 examination.
5. The learned single Judge, inter alia, held that in terms of Articles 29 and 30(1) of the Constitution of India, the minorities have a right to conserve their language, script or culture of its own and have also a right to establish and administer educational institutions of their choice, but, they cannot act contrary to the minority status certificate granted to them and deny admission to those students who profess different faith of the same minority community. The learned Judge held that unless the appellants obtain a certificate of Roman Catholic Christian Minority Status from the Government of Andhra Pradesh, they have no right to deny admission to the candidates who profess other than Roman Catholic Faith. It was held:
“Therefore, in view of my discussion supra, it is clear that the 4th and 5th respondents have flagrantly violated the rights of the Christian Minority candidates who profess other than Roman Catholic faith from the date of establishment of the institution. Therefore, the mis-interpretation which s given by the respondents 4 and 5 to the Minority Status Certificate issued by the Government, in respect of the Christianity as a whole, and that they can admit only the candidates who profess Roman Catholic and to deny admission to the candidates professing other than Roman Catholic, is illegal, unconstitutional and in violation of the orders issued by the Government from time to time. As stated by the respondents 4 and 5 in their counter affidavit as many as 44 candidates, other than Roman Catholics have applied in response to their notification, were been rejected, but they are not before the Court. The petitioner is the only candidate who is fighting for his legitimate right for admission in the 4th respondent college. Therefore, the question of considering their cases does not arise, but the case of the petitioner deserves to be considered and he deserves to be admitted to the course. The petitioner has been prosecuting this cause before this Hon’ble Court for all these days. Therefore, while calculating the required percentage of attendance, the 5th respondent is directed to take necessary steps to condone the same, as a special case, in view of the facts and circumstances of this case.
The respondents 4 and 5 who deliberately denied admission in the 4th respondent college, as admitted by them, from the academic year 1998-1999 knowing fully well that the minority status certificate is a General Certificate issued to them as a Christian Minority Institution as a whole and no further classification can be made, have deprived the rights of eligible candidates who got rank in Common Entrance Examination conducted by the Government. This matter deserves to be viewed seriously to prevent recurrence of the same in future. Since an enquiry was already initiated in the matter, the respondents 1 to 3 are directed to expedite the enquiry preferably within a period of two months from the date of receipt of a copy of this order and take appropriate action as per law, on the basis of the enquiry report, and intimate to this Hon’ble Court, as to action taken against 4th and 5th respondents.”
6. Mr. E. Manohar, learned Senior Counsel appearing for the appellants, inter alia, submitted that the learned single Judge erred in passing the impugned judgment inasmuch as for 108 seats, 192 candidates belonging to roman catholic faith and 44 candidates belonging to non-roman catholic faith have applied for, all the seats could be filled up from among the students who profess roman catholic faith. According to the learned counsel, it is not correct to contend that the Christian minority cannot be classified as catholics and protestants. In fact, protestant groups of Christians are also running three engineering institutions as compared to one institution run by the catholic Christians. It was submitted that in the instant case the minority status certificate was granted in favour of Christu Jyothi Institution of Technology and Science, managed by a society represented by the members of the roman catholic sect, which is clearly indicative of the fact that it was run by roman Catholics.
7. It is not in dispute that out of the 44 non-Roman Catholics students who had applied for admission into the institution in question, the writ petitioner ranked 20th.
8. It is also not in dispute that a minority status certificate was granted in favour of the 1st appellant herein by the State Government on 23.7.1999 which is a society representing the Christian minority community and as such the said institution was declared as a minority educational institution.
9. The State of Andhra Pradesh has enacted a statute called the Andhra Pradesh State Minorities Commission Act, 1998, (Act No.31 of 1998) (for short “the Act”) which has received the assent of the President on 25.11.1998. In terms of Section 2(d) of the said Act, “minority” means:
“the persons who profess faith in any one of the following religions namely:-
(i) Buddhism,
(ii) Christianity;
(iii) Islam
(iv) Sikhism;
(v) Zorastrianism Irrespective of the language spoken by them". 10. The correctness or otherwise of certificate granted under the said Act had not been questioned. The appellants had also not questioned the vires of the Act. Clause (1) of Article 30 reads thus: "Right of minorities to establish and administer educational institutions:- (1) All minorities, whether based on religion or language, shall have the right to establish and administer educational institutions of their choice.
In order to claim the benefit of the said constitutional provision, the community must show that it is a religious minority. The word “minority” has not been defined in the Constitution or in the Act. It would, however, ordinarily mean any community whose population is numerically less than 50% of the population of the State. In certain situations, a particular faith propagated by some people of a minority community may be held to be coming within the purview of ‘minority community’.
11. In the instant case, however, as indicated hereinbefore, the matter is governed by a statute and statutory rules.
12. The State in exercise of its power conferred by Section 3 read with Section 15 of the Andhra Pradesh Educational Institutions (Regulation of Admission and Prohibition of Capitation Fee) Act, 1983, made rules known as A.P. Educational Institutions (Regulation of admission into under-graduate professional courses (through common Entrance Test) Rules, 1993, in G.O.Ms.No.184, Education (EC.2) dated 20.8.1993. The said rules were further amended by G.O.Ms.No.227, Edn. dated 22.7.1994.
13. Rule 8A of the said rules reads thus:
“Minority Educational Institutions:-
(i) In the academic year 1994-95, fifty per cent of the total intake in minority professional colleges i.e. Medical and Engineering Colleges shall be filled up by candidates selected by the competent authority on the basis of the common merit list. The candidates selected shall be distributed equally in free seats as well as in payment seats in the order of merit. The remaining fifty per cent shall be filled up by the management of such minority professional colleges from the candidates belonging to the minority community on the basis of merit. Such merit shall be on the basis of:
(a) ranking in Intermediate examination or
(b) ranking in EAMCET examination or
(c) ranking in the test to be conducted by the management.
(ii) Fifty per cent of seats permitted to be filled by the minority professional colleges under sub-regulation (i) shall be equally distributed between free and payment seats.
(iii) After completion of admissions, each minority professional college shall submit to the competent authority the statements containing full particulars of students admitted under this regulation.
The competent authority shall verify the correctness of the statements and if any irregularity is noticed it shall call upon such professional colleges to rectify the same.
(iv) The competent authority shall conduct the verification keeping in view of the objective that the minority professional colleges are equally committed to promote excellence of the professional colleges as a vehicle of general secular education.”
14. Yet again by G.O.Ms.No.150, Minorities Welfare (M&R) Department dated 11.8.2000, certain instructions have been issued directing the minority educational institutions to follow the instructions contained therein.
15. In the aforementioned situation, we are of the opinion that the appellants herein having obtained the minority status certificate as only an institution run by the Christian minority community, cannot be permitted to turn round and contend that the institution being run by the society of Roman Catholics have a separate existence as minority community within Christianity Community. As already indicated hereinbefore, Section 2(d) of the Act mentions only of “Christian” minority community and the Act has not classified the said community into ‘Roman Catholic Faith” or “Protestant Faith” etc., “Minority” under Section 2(d), in our view, means all the faiths coming under “Christianity”. For the purpose of deriving the benefits under Articles 29 and 30 read with the provisions of the Act and the Rules, different groups of faiths among the “Christianity” put together would constitute “Christianity Minority Community”. All the different groups of faiths among the Christianity are equally entitled to claim the benefits provided for their community.
16. It is not in dispute that similar minority status certificates have been granted to other minority institutions, but, they have not made any distinction between the different groups of faiths among the Christian minority community while giving admission notification calling applications from the students belonging to the Christian minority community. The appellant herein, contrary to the intent and purport of the minority status certificate issued to their institution as also the provisions of the Act, issued an admission notification mentioning that the admission should be confined only to Roman Catholic Christian minority candidates. However, from the admission notifications issued by Dr. Paul Raj Engineering College, Bhadrachalm and Mother Therisa College of Engineering and Technology, Peddapally, Karimnagar district and various other Christian minority institutions, it appears that they have invited applications from all eligible Christian Minority candidates irrespective of the group of faith they belong and admissions were given to all candidates belonging to Christian minority community.
17. Furthermore, it appears from the list of candidates whose applications were not considered for admission during the year 2000-2001 in the institution in question, the petitioner was denied admission on the ground that he was a Methodist. Some of the applicants were denied admission on the ground that they are Adi Andhra Christians or belongs to Seventh Day Adventist or Christian Fellowship etc. Such considerations, in our view, having regard to the provisions of the Act must be held to be invalid.
18. Mr.E. Manohar, learned counsel appearing for the appellants has strongly placed reliance on the decision of the Madras High Court in DIRECTOR OF S.E., T.N. GOVT v G.AROGLASAMY1. In that case, the society which was running the institution consisted of members professing Roman Catholic faith. It is not in dispute that persons professing Roman Catholic faith would be a minority community but as noticed hereinbefore, in terms of the provisions of the said Act they belong to Christian religion. The Division Bench, in that case held, that the Government regulation throwing minority community students in general competition with all other community students and resulting in reducing their chances of admission to minority educational institution contravenes clause (1) of Article 30 of the Constitution. Such is not the position herein.
19. In SREE JAIN SWETAMBER TERAPANTHI VIDYALAYA v STATE2 it was held that Jain Swetamber Terapanthi sect constitutes religious minority. There is no dispute with regard to the aforementioned proposition.
20. In ST.XAVIERS COLLEGE v STATE OF GUJARAT3 a nine Judge Bench of the apex court held that Clause (1) of Article 30 of the Constitution covers institutions imparting general secular education.
21. In A.M.PATRONI v E.C.KESAVAN4 a Full Bench of the Kerala High Court held that the Christians of Kerala being 21.22% of the population as shown in 1961 census, the Roman Catholics who formed a section of that community would be minority within clause (1) of Article 30 of the Constitution.
22. In N.AHMAD v MANAGER, EMJAY HIGH SCHOOL5 the Supreme Court held that selection of headmaster in a school or a principal of a college being a matter of prime importance in the admission into educational institutions, any interference with the right of the management with regard thereto by the State shall be violative of Clause (1) of Article 30.
23. However, the questions which arise for consideration in this Writ Appeal did not arise in any of the aforementioned cases. As noticed hereinbefore, those who profess Roman Catholic faith, having obtained a minority status certificate as an institution run by the persons belonging to Christian religion, cannot claim a higher right.
24. For the reasons aforementioned, we are of the opinion that as in terms of clause (1) of Article 30 of the Constitution, if a minority community is able to show that it is a religious minority, the appellants cannot for their own reasons refuse to grant admission to the students belonging to that community although professing another faith. There is no merit in this appeal which is accordingly dismissed. There shall be no order as to costs.