Unable to start law college in Nashik: MET

Mumbai: The Mumbai Education Trust (MET), founded by beleaguered NCP leader Chhagan Bhujbal in 1989, has approached the Bombay high court saying that it is unable to start a new law college in Nashik because of alleged negligence on the part of the government. The court’s vacation bench has now issued notice to Savitribai Phule University, Pune, asking it to file an affidavit in reply to the petition claiming that though the university forwarded recommendation for commencement of the law college by MET, the state denied receiving any such recommendation.

The petition, filed by senior counsel Mihir Desai and advocate Shalab Saxena, contends that MET wants to start a new law college on land allotted by the government in 2004. The lawyers on Friday informed Justice K.K. Tated that though the trust has spent a huge amount and is ready with necessary infrastructure to start the law college, the government has not granted sanction for the same, saying it did not receive recommendation from Pune’s Savitribai Phule University through which the law college was supposed to be started. The petition alleges that the university under RTI gave copies of documents that show that recommendations were forwarded by it to the government within the stipulated time. However the government denies receiving  them.

The petitioner has requested the court to call records and papers of the petitioner’s case to find out if the state government has misplaced the documents and also direct the government to issue requisite approval so that it can start the law college for academic year 2017-18. The contention of the trust is that it should not be made to suffer due to the government’s mistake.