Minority status of Aligarh Muslim University not lost due to statute: Supreme Court

The Supreme Court on Friday overruled its 1967 judgement, which had held that an educational institution set up by an Act of Parliament cannot claim to be a minority institution, Live Law reported.

A Constitution bench headed by Chief Justice DY Chandrachud and comprising Justices Sanjiv Khanna, Surya Kant, JB Pardiwala, Dipankar Datta, Manoj Misra and Satish Chandra Sharma, was hearing a batch of petitions relating to the minority status of the Aligarh Muslim University.

In the 1967 Azeez Basha judgement, the court had held Aligarh Muslim University to be a central university. The judgement also said that Article 29 and Article 30 of the Constitution cannot be conferred on it to grant a minority status.

“We have held that to be a minority institution it only had to be established by the minority and not necessarily be administered by the minority members,” said Chandrachud while pronouncing the 4:3 majority judgement, reported Bar and Bench. “Minority institutions may wish to emphasise secular education and for that minority members are not needed in administration.”

Kant, Datta and Sharma wrote a dissenting judgement.

The chief justice said that whether the university is a minority institution will be decided by a regular bench based the tests laid down by the court in this judgement.

The case was argued over eight hearings in January...

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