Himachal High Court dismissed an Appeal filed by H.P. University

Vijyender Sharma

SHIMLA----The High Court of H.P. dismissed an  Appeal filed by the H.P. University, challenging the order of  payment of compensation of Rs.40,000/-  to a student,   who had  alleged that irreparable loss was caused to his career due to delay in issuance of the consolidated mark sheet of M.A.(Economics) to him.

            The  Division Bench comprising Acting Chief  Justice Ravi Malimath and Justice Jyotsna Rewa Dua, while dismissing the appeal, upheld the decision of the Single Judge and  observed that a larger amount of compensation was liable to be imposed  in  this matter.

The writ petitioner Naveen Kumar  had filed a writ petition alleging that the H.P. University was not issuing the consolidated mark sheet for M.A. Economics to him, despite the fact that he  had passed all the papers of M.A. Economics in the year 2005.  He had alleged that the University had shown  him absent in one of the courses, whereas he had appeared in that Course. He made representation to the University stating that he was not absent in any of the paper and also visited the authorities time and again  to get his result settled and lateron, the University officials verified from the  attendance sheet that he was present in both the papers.  He  was assured by the University  that the matter shall be settled very soon, but after passing all the papers in the year 2005, when he applied for  the consolidated mark sheet, his application was again rejected.  He again visited University many times  to get the matter settled after verifying his attendance from record, but the University officials refused to do so by stating that they  have no time to look for the old records.

The petitioner had alleged that  in whole process he spent thousands of rupees and was  subjected to the ill behavior of the officials of the University.    He alleged that those were his career defining years, but due this reason in many of the interviews he was deprived from getting the weight-age on account of P.G. Degree and was also  deprived from either applying  or from appearing in many of the examinations,  in which P.G. Degree was required.

He had prayed that University may be directed to issue his consolidated mark sheet for M.A. Economics and  to pay compensation of Rs. 5 lacs to him for causing suffering and irreparable loss to him. 

During the hearing of the petition, the H.P. University had admitted that the petitioner had appeared in Course III but  had  scored 19 marks in the said Course.

The Single Bench had allowed the petition  directing the H.P. University to grant atleast three chances to the petitioner to pass the Course and to pay compensation of  Rs.40,000/- to the petitioner.  

The H.P. University  filed the appeal against the orders of the Single Judge.

Dismissing the appeal, the Court observed that learned Single Judge has been  very magnanimous in ordering such a meager amount against the appellants-University. The Court also observed that for the error committed, a larger amount of compensation was liable to be imposed, however, a very nominal amount of compensation has been ordered by the learned  Single Judge. The Court observed that it finds no ground to interfere with the impugned order passed by the learned Single Judge and dismissed the appeal.