New Delhi (TIP)- The Parliament did a “half-hearted” job in amending the Aligarh Muslim University (AMU) Act in 1981, the Supreme Court remarked on Thursday, February 1, pointing out though the amendments sought to include the Muslim voice in the administration of the institution, it fell short of conferring the “complete minority character” on AMU.
As the seven-judge bench led by Chief Justice of India Dhananjaya Y Chandrachud reserved its judgment in the case relating to minority status of AMU, the court observed that the amendments made in 1981 changed the definition of the term “university” under the AMU Act to state that it was established by Muslims and made some other changes.
“So, it was really placating those sentiments. But when it actually came to the brass tacks, they did not go back to the position prior to 1951. And what they actually did was that it brought the Muslim voice into the AMU administration as we see it. But it still stopped short,” commented the bench, which also comprised justices Sanjiv Khanna, Surya Kant, JB Pardiwala, Dipankar Datta, Manoj Misra and Satish Chandra Sharma.
The court added that the 1981 amendments did not restore the position that existed prior to 1951. After the Constitution was enforced, the original AMU Act of 1920 was modified to remove provision for compulsory religious education; to provide for the University to be open to students of all caste, creed, sex, etc; remove the requirement of all the members of the Court (administrative body of the University) to be Muslims.
“In other words, 1981 amendment does a half-hearted job. We can understand if the 1981 amendments said, ‘Okay, we are going back to the position in 1920’, conferring a complete minority character. But they changed some definitions…Even the parliament, which had the power to do it, stopped short of taking us back to the 1920 Act. They made a few concessions, but they never took it back to 1920,” it observed.
Following wide-ranging arguments spanning eight day-long hearings, the Constitution bench on Thursday reserved its judgment in the matter. If declared a minority institution, AMU need not reserve seats for Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes, Other Backward Classes (OBC) and Economically Weaker Sections (EWS).
On Thursday, Feb 1, senior counsel Rajeev Dhavan, Kapil Sibal, Salman Khurshid and advocate MR Shamshad made submissions on behalf of AMU and other petitioners that have pressed for a reconsideration of the Supreme Court’s five-judge bench judgment in the Azeez Basha case in 1967.
The 1967 judgment declared that AMU was not a minority institution and could not enjoy protection for minorities to administer educational institutions under Article 30(1) of the Constitution. In 1981, Parliament passed amendments to the AMU Act to change the definition of “university” in its endeavour to grant minority status to AMU.
The Allahabad high court, however, junked these amendments in 2006, leading to AMU and the then United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government to challenge it before the Supreme Court. But in 2016, in a reversal of the previous stand, the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government sought to withdraw the Centre’s appeal, maintaining that AMU is not a minority institution and that the Basha judgment was correct. The Centre also said that it does not support the 1981 amendments in the AMU Act. Source: HT