Lucknow, Sep 17 The Allahabad High Court on Thursday stayed the judgment of a single bench that quashed the dismissal of Prof Mahrukh Mirza, former vice chancellor of Khwaja Moinuddin Chishti Language University, Lucknow.
A Lucknow bench of Justices Rajan Roy and Manjive Shukla passed the order on a special appeal filed by the university against the August 5 judgment of the single bench comprising Justice Rajiv Singh on Mirza's writ petition.
The two-judge bench observed that the single judge had recorded findings on the merits of the charges against Mirza while ignoring the limits of judicial review. It further observed that, prima facie, the findings relating to three charges -- the alleged forgery of the no-objection certificate (NOC), alleged illegal appointments and non-recording of biometric attendance -- were suspect.
The two-judge bench observed, "Considering the nature of the charges and also as, prima facie, the findings relating to the three charges are suspect, we are of the opinion that the impugned judgment deserves to be stayed."
The special appeal has been directed to be listed after two months for hearing.
Earlier, on behalf of the university, senior lawyer L P Mishra had argued that the single-judge order was unsustainable as the controversy was surrounding 13 appointments allegedly made illegally during Mirza's tenure as vice chancellor and only seven of these appointments had been validated by the university's executive council or the chancellor.
In respect of the remaining six, the employees' services had been terminated and their petitions were pending adjudication before the high court.
The two-judge bench found that the above aspect had been overlooked by the single bench. It also noted that the six petitions relating to the terminated employees had earlier been connected with Mirza's petition but were subsequently delinked, leaving only Mirza's petition to be decided.
