The governing body of St. Stephens put forward their plea in the urge of including at least any one Supreme Council Christian Member for the interview process of the candidates. The petition was represented by the professors of St. Stephens along with the Senior Advocate A Mariarputham along with Advocates Rajesh Roshan and Romy Chacko. The plea was dismissed by the High Court thereby condemning the inclusion of Supreme Council Member. The decision was led by the Single Judge Bench of Justice Anu Malhotra stating:
“That the institution which is a minority institution seeks to maintain its Christian tenets and its Christian outlook and philosophy cannot be sought to be assailed by the petitioners on the anvil of Article 14 of the Constitution which is no manner is infringed in the instant case. Significantly there has been no grievance put forth by any Christian Student of being in any manner discriminated against by the decision.”
The Court denied the plea in the observance that “in any manner that the induction of a Christian member to the governing body for interviewing only the Christian candidates” was “violative” of the Clause 5 of the college institution.
Following the decision, the court also directed that except the Principal no member of the Supreme Council body should be the panellist for the academic season 2019-20. The objective behind the verdict of non-inclusion of any Supreme Council Member is the fear of induction of the Management quota. Contradicting to which the governing body of the St. Stephens argued that inclusion of the member of Supreme Council will not in any way trivialize the merit of the candidature of the student as the decision will be deemed unanimously and in the hands of just one panellist.
